International Mountain Day 2022 “Women Move Mountains” Opening Remarks
by Dr QU Dongyu, FAO Director-General
09/12/2022
International Mountain Day 2022
“Women Move Mountains”
Opening Remarks
By
Dr QU Dongyu, Director-General, FAO
9 December 2022
Excellences,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Dear Mountain Friends,
1. Welcome to all the participant of this year’s International Mountain Day event, both in person here in Rome and connected online.
2. I would like to thank the Governments of Andorra and Italy for their continued support to the Mountain Partnership and its Secretariat hosted at FAO,
3. And to all stakeholders.
4. As the International Year of Sustainable Mountain Development 2022 draws to a close, let us reflect on what has been achieved and the challenges ahead.
5. The ongoing impacts of the climate crisis, biodiversity loss and food insecurity challenges, combined with other ongoing crises and emergencies, call on us to double our efforts to save the natural and human capital of our precious mountains.
6. FAO is committed to supporting mountain people to protect their ecosystems, including through the work of the Mountain Partnership.
Ladies and gentlemen,
7. This year’s theme “Women Move Mountains” is crucial because women are vital to conserve mountain ecosystems,
8. But they face many constraints.
9. Women often lack access to credit, land ownership, markets, trainings and digitalization.
10. Due to their distance from markets and urban centers, women often suffer from long value chains.
11. Yet mountain women are rich – rich in culture, in traditional knowledge, expertise and heritage.
12. The Italy-funded FAO Mountain Partnership Products Initiative taps exactly into this potential.
13. It promotes high quality agricultural products, as well as the cultural heritage of mountain women to the global fashion market.
14. It is time to value mountain women and strengthen our support – providing them with the access they need, especially to science, innovation, digitalization and technology.
15. Gender equality is central to FAO’s mandate to achieve food security for all by raising levels of nutrition, improving agricultural productivity and natural resource management, and improving the lives of rural populations, especially women and youth.
16. Let us work together to ensure that women realize their strength to move mountains!
17. For the transformation of agrifood systems to be more efficient, more inclusive, more resilient and more sustainable,
18. For our common goal of the Four Betters: better production, better nutrition, a better environment, and a better life for all – to leave no one behind.
19. Thank you.