FAO-Belgium: Pioneering innovative approaches to saving lives and livelihoods, while building resilience

FAO Director for Emergencies and Resilience, Dominique Burgeon and FAO Brussels Director Rodrigo de Lapuerta met with Belgian Director for Humanitarian Aid Transition, Erik de Maeyer and his team. Together, they reviewed the strong cooperation between the Kingdom of Belgium and FAO including Belgium’s support to anticipatory action, through the FAO Special Fund for Emergency Activities (SFERA) and the joint response to COVID-19 impacts and to the desert locust outbreak. FAO acknowledged Belgium’s contributions to innovative projects including the development of digital tools such as the Fall Armyworm Monitoring and Early Warning System (FAMEWS), the Fall Armyworm Risk-Map and to tackle Fall Army Worm and on solar energy facilities in the Gaza Strip. Both parties recognized the strong communication efforts on the partnership and agreed to organize an advocacy event in Brussels during the next months.

Belgium is one of FAO’s major partners and its commitment to provide flexible funding has boosted FAO’s capacity to pioneer more innovative ways to achieve results and to respond more quickly to emergencies. FAO and Belgium have a longstanding partnership and joint vision to save lives, safeguard livelihoods and human dignity, and build resilience to future crises while bridging the humanitarian-development-peace nexus.

More information on the FAO-Belgium partnership is available here.