MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

World’s main food suppliers host FAO regional conference in Buenos Aires

Graziano da Silva, fifty million Latin Americans are under nourished

Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO, opened Monday its Latin America and Caribbean Regional Conference in Buenos Aires which will extend until next Friday when it will announce the issues that will guide FAO actions worldwide.

The conference is held every two years and is the highest governing body and forum of the organization in the region. Thirty two Agriculture ministers from the region are attending including those from Mercosur, the region’s main producer and world supplier of food.

During the conference, government representatives from all of FAO member countries gather to discuss the main challenges that Latin America and the Caribbean faces with regards to agriculture and food security, as well as reviewing the actions undertaken by FAO during the previous biennial, and setting the regional priorities that the Organization will follow during the following two years.

Consequently, the Conference is primordially a forum where FAO member countries, government representatives, civil society and the private sector gather to set the roadmap that FAO must follow from 2012 till 2014.

The Buenos Aires gathering is particularly important since as of 2012, regional conferences will no longer only be technical and advisory in nature, but will establish themes that will guide FAO actions worldwide.

This means that the themes and priorities established by the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean for the development of agriculture and the fight against hunger will go directly to the Council and the FAO Conference as part of their official agenda.

Regional priorities will also have an important role in the FAO Program and Finance Committees, whose mission will be to include them in the organization's programs and to ensure they are reflected in the results of FAO actions.

During the conference, FAO Regional Office will present two main documents for discussion, on climate change and food security. FAO activities will also be revised, in view of the previous Conference’s recommendations, as will be the case with the regional budget and work program for 2012 and 2013.

The main conclusions from the regional technical bodies, COFLAC (forestry), CODEGALAC (livestock) and COOPESCAAL and COPACO (fisheries), will also be presented to the member countries.

“Latin America and the Caribbean face today the challenge of defeating the paradox which means that a region net exporter of food is at the same time home of 50 million of its residents which suffer from under-nutrition”, said FAO Director General Jose Graziano da Silva.

Eradicating hunger “is not only totally compatible with economic development, a sustainable management of natural resources adapting to mitigation and climate change, but also contributes to advance towards those objectives” added da Silva.