In August 2023, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Asian Partnership for the Development of Human Resources in Rural Asia (AsiaDHRRA) have renewed their Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for an additional five years.  Together, the parties have recommitted to support rural organizations and family farmers’ organizations on the road to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture.

FAO and AsiaDHRRA have a long history of collaboration, preceding the formalization of the partnership via MoU in 2020. Over the years, both parties have worked closely together to enhance the voices, representation and participation of rural organizations, including farmers’ organizations, in key policy and advocacy processes, including the FAO Regional Conference for Asia and the Pacific, the Committee on World Food Security, and in the implementation of the UN Decade of Family Farming.  

AsiaDHRRA has been actively involved in the organization of the CSO consultations prior to the FAO Regional Conferences, which take place every two years.  As a leading member of the steering committee that organize the CSO consultations, they play a strategic role in creating synergies and leveraging inputs from stakeholders across the region to be able to effectively contribute to regional policy discussions.

Under the framework of the previous MoU, FAO and AsiaDHRRA organized a number of successful activities to strengthen capacities of farmers’ organizations, cooperatives and CSOs to engage in agriculture and food systems and in policy dialogue related to the CFS Principles for Responsible Investment in Agriculture and Food Systems (CFS-RAI).  Specifically, together with FAO, three learning needs assessment workshops were organized in three ASEAN countries (Cambodia, Laos and the Phillippines), along with comprehensive RAI learning curriculum developed for farmers’ organizations, cooperatives and CSOs.  Further trainings on youth and gender and other multistakeholder dialogue events were also organized.

The renewed MoU provides a five-year framework to continue these efforts, particularly in support of engaging in joint capacity development activities as well as awareness raising on CFS-RAI for rural organizations and small-scale farmers’ organizations. 

The MoU was renewed through an exchange of letters, signed on behalf of FAO by Jong-Jin Kim, Assistant Director-General/Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific, and on behalf of AsiaDHRRA by Marlene Ramirez, Secretary General. 

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AsiaDHRRA is a regional partnership of eleven social development networks and organizations in eleven Asian countries that envisions Asian rural communities that are just, free, prosperous, living in peace and working in solidarity towards self-reliance. 

For more information about the partner: https://asiadhrra.org