Virtual Trainings on SDG Indicator 2.4.1. “Proportion of Agricultural Area under Productive and Sustainable Agriculture” (April-November 2021)

The overall objective of these virtual trainings were to provide (government officials responsible for monitoring SDG indicator 2.4.1) capacity development on the methodology, data collection and analysis relevant to sustainable food and agriculture and how to assess data gaps starting from available national and subnational (farm-level) information and associated reporting processes. More specifically, a four half-days virtual trainings were organized between April and November 2021 to:

• Provide technical training to build capacity of the national staff on SDG indicator 2.4.1 methodology, compilation and interpretation.
• Introduce the tools for data collection (including alternative data sources).
• Identify available national and sub-national farm level and other data useful to analyze sustainable food and agriculture.
• Understand the data gaps.
• Discuss the country plans to collect data on the indicator in the short/medium/long term.
• Introduce additional mechanisms/frameworks to measure and monitor sustainable agriculture.

The online trainings were composed of participants from 10 or more countries and offered an opportunity to share good practices and experiences. Furthermore, the trainings provided participants a platform to discuss and share their strategies for overcoming the potential challenges regarding data collection, analysis and reporting of SDG indicator 2.4.1.

Expected Outputs

This virtual training helped the counterparts evaluate availability of national and sub-national data needed to compute indicator 2.4.1, understand its measurement challenges, introduce effective data collection mechanisms with an ultimate aim to provide basis for designing improved data-driven policies. More particularly, the expected outputs were the following:

• Train the national staff on the methodology and tools for SDG indicator 2.4.1, so that its adoption at the country level and its reporting to FAO can be supported.
• Assessment of the current situation in terms data availability on the 11 sub-indicators of SDG 2.4.1 and to discuss on these data gaps can be bridged.
• Assessment of country data status in terms of available national statistics of relevance for reporting on sustainable food and agriculture in other international contexts (SDGs, Climate Change, FAO) and as possible proxies for SDG indicator 2.4.1.

These assessments will be instrumental in planning and developing an action plan for national data collection and reporting.