MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Latam and Caribbean committed to eradicate hunger in the region by 2025

All thirty-three countries of the region signed up at the FAO conference in Chile

Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean have advanced a robust agenda aimed at achieving the eradication of hunger in the region, during a major FAO meeting which concluded on Friday in Chile.

 All thirty-three countries of the region have reaffirmed their commitment to eradicate hunger by 2025 via the Hunger-Free Latin America and the Caribbean Initiative, as well as pledged to strengthen actions to eliminate malnutrition.

“What we have seen in this Conference is a huge regional commitment to progress on food security by governments, civil society and the private sector, which has been turned into a concrete agenda of actions to eradicate hunger”, said FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva.

The priority that governments are giving to the fight against hunger was evinced by the participation at the conference of top leaders from across the region, including the President of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, the Vice-President for Social Matters of Venezuela, Hector Rodriguez, the First Lady of Peru, Nadine Heredia, and 19 State ministers and 12 deputy-ministers, all of whom agreed to implement various international cooperation initiatives.

The Minister of Agriculture of Chile and President of the Regional Conference, Carlos Furche, expressed his satisfaction with the results of the meeting, highlighting the cooperative agreements between countries to overcome hunger and promote the sustainable development of agriculture.

The Minister noted that countries of the region congratulated FAO on its work in support of their national and regional efforts to achieve food security. Finally the region's governments also approved three regional initiatives as the fundamental guidelines for FAO's regional work program for the next two years.

The first involves supporting the Hunger-Free Latin America and the Caribbean 2025 Initiative; the second focuses on family farming and territorial development in rural areas; and the third seeks to improve food and agricultural systems at the national and regional level.