World Food Forum: Strong momentum as Hand-in-Hand Investment Forum opens
(298).png)
Figure: FAO Director-General QU Dongyu addresses participants in the Hand-in-Hand Investment Forum 2023. ©FAO/Giulio Napolitano
FAO NEWS - 17/10/2023
Rome – The second Hand-in-Hand Investment Forum began today, intent on quadrupling the more than $3 billion in fresh resources proposed in the inaugural event in 2022 to invest in poverty reduction, improved food security and sustainable agrifood systems that benefit the poorest.
“Without innovation and investment there is no future,” said QU Dongyu, Director-General of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), which runs the Initiative and is hosting the Forum during the World Food Forum. He emphasized the importance of all stakeholders and especially the private sector in improving productivity and efficiency for the people who need it most.
Qu urged participants to engage in the Forum as a “heartfelt” at a time when “heartbroken” news is too common. Shifting the narrative requires using our hands, he said.
67 FAO Member Countries are now active Hand-in-Hand participants, and 35 ministers from the 31 countries participating in the four-day Forum, which facilitates pitching scalable agrifood investments to possible investment partners ranging from the private sector to important non-profit foundations and includes a range of global, regional and subregional multilateral bodies and financial institutions.
“As a government-led and owned Initiative, Hand-in-Hand supports member Governments drive their agrifood systems transformation. This requires significant and scalable investments in agrifood systems which are data-led, based on untapped national agrifood potential and market demand,” said FAO Chief Economist Maximo Torero, who leads the Initiative. Some 109 investments, designed for over 140 million beneficiaries, will be presented by governments and through the regional initiatives at the Forum.
Those pitches will showcase more than $14 billion of detailed agrifood investment opportunities, ranging from halving losses and tripling productivity of tomatoes in Nigeria, a 170 percent increase in climate-smart cocoa productivity in Ecuador, engaging women and youth in agriculture through the Building Better Tomorrow programme in Tanzania, and investing in storage and agro-processing facilities for fruits and vegetables destined for national and international markets in Bangladesh.
Outlines of the government presentations are posted online here.
Views: 287