Amman – The scenario in Gaza, coupled with protracted crises in Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, is of “nice concern,” the Director-Common of the Meals and Agriculture Group of the United Nations (FAO), QU Dongyu, stated Monday as he addressed the thirty seventh session of the FAO Regional Ministerial Convention for the Close to East and North Africa (NENA).
The convention in Amman introduced collectively authorities officers, lecturers and representatives of the personal sector and civil society from the area and befell towards the backdrop of a worrying rise in starvation and malnutrition estimates.
In response to FAO’s newest figures, starvation within the Arab States reached its highest worth because the begin of the millennium in 2022, with 59.8 million undernourished folks. This represents a 75.9 p.c enhance from 2000, which corresponds to 12.9 p.c of the inhabitants, nicely above the worldwide common of 9.2 p.c.
The scenario has since reached a vital level in Gaza, the place the inhabitants is experiencing catastrophic ranges of conflict-induced meals insecurity and a excessive threat of famine.
Throughout his tackle to the convention, Qu emphasised the essential function performed by FAO in Gaza, notably when it comes to offering emergency reduction and collaborating in rebuilding efforts. FAO is a part of the joint UN flash enchantment and is carefully coordinating with the broader UN household and companions in responding most appropriately and successfully, in keeping with its mandate.
FAO has additionally issued a name for $20 million within the Nov 2023 UN Interagency Flash Attraction and plans to reactivate the manufacturing of perishable, extremely nutritious meals that can’t be imported as meals support, together with recent milk, meat, and greens, Qu stated.
Overlapping crises
The disaster in Gaza provides to a number of long-standing challenges dealing with the area. These embody the destructive impacts of the local weather disaster, low per capita freshwater availability, rising populations and urbanization, in addition to heavy dependence on imported meals.
Moreover, overlapping crises such because the COVID-19 pandemic, the results of ongoing conflicts and battle in different components of the world, together with rising financial and monetary challenges, notably the rise in meals costs, have compounded these difficulties.
All these challenges are impacting world agrifood methods, emphasizing the necessity for an pressing transformation of our agrifood methods to change into extra environment friendly, extra inclusive, extra resilient, and extra sustainable, Qu stated.
“For that reason, the theme of this Regional Convention is ‘accelerating’ this transformation – it couldn’t be extra related and timelier than now,” Qu stated.
Within the NENA area particularly, “we’re seeing a worrying development of a steady enhance in starvation and malnutrition previously years,” Qu stated.
With roughly 60 p.c of the area’s inhabitants affected by starvation and greater than half of the inhabitants not in a position to afford a nutritious diet, there’s a sturdy reliance on imported meals, resulting in fast soil erosion and depleting agricultural sources.
That’s the reason “there isn’t any extra time to waste in controlling the harm brought about – we urgently must safeguard our agrifood methods for present and future generations. To do that, we want a shared imaginative and prescient, foresight, possession, an implementation technique, and a transparent path resulting in affect and outcomes, within the quick, medium, and long run,” Qu instructed the convention.
The opening of the thirty seventh session was additionally addressed by the Prime Minister of Jordan, Bisher Khasawneh, who expressed his concern over the scenario in Gaza and thanked Qu for attending the convention, saying Jordan was working laborious to remodel its meals methods throughout the worth chain to spice up meals safety and financial improvement.
The convention is being chaired by Jordan’s Minister of Agriculture, Khalid Al- Hanifat.
Convention priorities
FAO has a battery of vital devices designed to help the transformation of agrifood methods within the area and assist obtain the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Improvement, in addition to the UN’s Sustainable Improvement Objectives. These embody FAO’s Strategic Framework 2022-31, flagship initiatives such because the Hand-in-Hand and the One Nation One Precedence Product, in addition to a powerful deal with science, innovation, and expertise.
Nevertheless, “We have to do extra and higher collectively,” Qu stated.
The Director-Common went on to spotlight some key areas that in his view require extra focus and a spotlight. These embody higher use of science, expertise and innovation; extra commerce, notably intra-regional commerce; encouraging international and nationwide investments, each from the private and non-private sectors; and extra motion by way of efforts such because the Water Shortage Initiatives to handle the adversarial impacts of the local weather disaster.
The convention is to debate 4 main priorities for FAO to prepare its help and maximize its affect throughout nations within the NENA area over the subsequent two years.
These are: 1) Rural transformation and inclusive worth chains, which entails addressing challenges similar to excessive rural unemployment, youth migration to cities, rural poverty and the widening rural-urban divide; 2) Meals safety and wholesome diets for all, which entails FAO offering its help to Members to higher reply to challenges posed by the rising divide between meals provide and demand pushed by inhabitants progress and rising revenue, within the face of restricted pure sources (water and land), and the rising downside of malnutrition, poor meals security and high quality; 3) Greening agriculture: addressing water shortage and local weather motion; and 4) Constructing resilience to a number of shocks, which entails FAO’s help to Members in addressing the challenges arising from protracted conflicts and a number of shocks and crises confronted by agrifood methods.
