Bilateral meeting with Retno L.P. Marsudi, UN Special Envoy on Water

Bangkok – The FAO Director-General QU Dongyu met with Retno L.P. Marsudi, UN Special Envoy on Water, on the margins of the International Soil and Water Forum 2024.

The Director-General welcomed the UN Special Envoy, and congratulated her on her appointed on 1 November 2024. The Director-General highlighted FAO’s unique technical capacity in the UN system to support the sustainable conservation and management of land, water and soil across the agrifood sector. The Director-General looked forward to a close collaboration with the UN Special Envoy in support of agrifood systems transformation and achieving the SDGs.

The Special Envoy thanked the Director-General for the invitation to the International Soil and Water Forum 2024, noting that it was an important global process in the lead up to the 2026 UN Water Conference to be co-hosted by Senegal and the United Arab Emirates. The Special Envoy emphasized the need to enhance international cooperation and ensure synergies for integrated land, soil and water management and appreciated FAO’s critical role in convening partners to deliver affordable and sustainable technologies and innovations that enable sustainable water resources management and the long-term health and productivity of soils.

The Director-General urged that the momentum created through global fora and processes such as the Rio Convention COPS, as well as the International Soil and Water Forum 2024, be transformed into tangible actions that leave no-one behind. QU reiterated that innovative development solutions from the Global South, such as Indonesia and others, be shared globally thereby contributing to the transformation of agrifood systems and the Four Betters: better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life – leaving no one behind.