Read-out of the bilateral meeting between FAO Director-General, QU Dongyu, and the Vice-Minister for Health of El Salvador, Carlos Gabriel Alvarenga

28 July 2021, Rome - FAO Director-General, QU Dongyu, and the Vice-Minister for Health of El Salvador, Carlos Gabriel Alvarenga, today had a bilateral meeting on the margins of the Pre-Summit of the UN Food Systems Summit 2021.

The Vice-Minister took the opportunity to present the measures being implemented by the Salvadoran Government to improve the living conditions of the most vulnerable people, as well as to ensure food security and provide a better nutrition to the population, which includes a strategy on school meals.

He also mentioned the implementation of a master plan to promote the agricultural sector based on three pillars: (i) to reach food sovereignty; (ii) to improve the coffee sector; and (iii) to work at the community level, focusing on providing infrastructure, education, health and water.

The Director-General pointed out the importance of promoting resilience to the impacts of the climate crisis and highlighted actions and projects supported by FAO in the Central American Dry Corridor. He noted that measures to be implemented within the Hand-in-Hand Initiative could support the coffee industry in El Salvador, as well as generate new incomes to smallholder farmers by prioritizing cash crops.