Regional cooperation is essential to overcome the impact of climate change, the pandemic and the war in Ukraine on food and agriculture, said Máximo Torero, FAO’s chief economist, on Friday.
“The region is beginning to understand that it needs to cooperate and work,” Torero said in an interview published during an FAO conference in Quito.
“The presence of Caribbean countries, of small islands that didn’t usually come, and now they’re coming because they have a very serious problem, which is climate change, is impressive,” Torero said.
He added that the countries of the region are also facing the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the war between Russia and Ukraine that was unleashed on February 24.
The challenge for countries is to achieve greater diversification in global grain production and exports.
“That’s why Ukraine and Russia affect us, and the same thing happens with fertilizers. So we have to see how there are other great granaries in the world,” said the chief economist at the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).
Opening the 37th FAO Latin America and Caribbean Conference, the organization’s director Qu Dongyu said the war in Ukraine is threatening the world’s food security due to soaring food and fertilizer prices.
Torero stressed the region’s potential for food production as its lands are “high quality” producers.
“It’s a region that could actually feed the world if we agree to work better, have better information, and accelerate information, technology and innovation,” he said.
The official stressed that “agriculture has shown great resilience amid an adverse environment.”
“Governments and the world (as a result of the pandemic) have had a strong focus on health and when we started to spread the slogan ‘There is no health if there is no food’ I think that was heard and farming helped move forward,” he said.
During the FAO regional conference in Quito, which will last until Friday, ministers from the region will meet to promote healthy diets, promote inclusive rural development and promote sustainable and resilient agriculture.
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