FAO Director-General meets Mars Inc. representatives

9 December 2019, Rome - FAO Director-General QU Dongyu met today with senior representatives of Mars Inc. including David Crean, Vice President, Corporate R&D, Howard Shapiro, Chief Agricultural Officer, and John Cordaro, Special Representative for Food Security, Nutrition and Safety for talks focused on strengthening the UN agency’s partnership with the American global manufacturer of food products.

The parties discussed the renewal of the Memorandum of Understanding between FAO and Mars Inc., which is expected to be signed in 2020 and will focus on a wide range of topics, including food safety, food security, Antimicrobial resistance (AMR), crop diversification. The renewed agreement could provide a platform for joint efforts on food security and food safety.

The Director-General, highlighted that, under his leadership, FAO is giving great importance to the CODEX Alimentarius and the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) and emphasized the significance of international standards for improving food safety. QU also added that by developing capacity at national level to the meet the international standards, strengthening quality control, the quality and safety of food could be improved, including for the international market.

During the meeting, QU said FAO supports the African Orphan Crops Consortium’s (AOCC) initiatives on neglected and unutilized crops and praised the African Plant Breeding Academy (AfPBA) for training scientists and encouraging them to work more closely with industries for a better understanding of the actual needs and demands.

QU also presented FAO’s new Hand-in-Hand initiative, which prioritizes targeted work that benefits people in the world’s most vulnerable regions, inviting Mars Inc. to collaborate with FAO in a number of countries and to take the lead among the private sector participants in the initiative.