Bilateral meeting with the EU Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries - H.E. Virginijus Sinkevičius

Rome - Today the FAO Director-General, QU Dongyu, met at FAO headquarters in Rome with H.E. Virginijus Sinkevičius, EU Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, on the sidelines of the UN Food Systems Summit +2 Stocktaking Moment taking place at FAO Headquarters from 24 to 26 July.

The Director-General thanked the Commissioner for the longstanding support from the European Union and recalled the in-person meeting the pair had in Brussels in 2019. The Commissioner congratulated the Director-General on his re-election for a second mandate, and noted that the EU’s work in the context of the Global Biodiversity Framework as a concrete example where the EU is playing an important role in implementation.

The pair discussed the importance of effectively tackling common challenges related to the climate crisis, water stress, soil and forest degradation and biodiversity loss, to get the buy in of all partners in the process of transforming global agrifood systems.

In that regard, the Director-General mentioned the pivotal role of SIDS, LDCs & LLDCs in preserving biodiversity, as discussed in the recent Ministerial event: Transforming agrifood systems in SIDS, LDCs & LLDCs, that took place at FAO last month.