FAO/Mazen Haffar

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has hosted an inception workshop with key stakeholders to launch the design of national strategy for food system transformation, under the framework of the technical corporation project ‘sustainable and inclusive agrifood system transformation in Syria’.

In close cooperation with the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform (MAAR) and following a participatory method whereby all the national stakeholders are actively involved, the project aims to prepare a national strategy for inclusive and sustainable transformation of agri-food systems in the Syrian Arab Republic. The strategy is one step towards creating an enabling environment for rural development that is characterized by harnessing all potential untapped opportunities to boost welfare inclusively for the benefit of the entire rural society and across all parts of the agrifood system.

“Today’s inception workshop is a two-way dialogue between FAO, MAAR, policy makers from relevant government institutions, and key stakeholders from the private and non-government sectors involved in the whole agri-food system to analyze the current situation of agrifood systems in Syria,” says Toni Ettel, FAO’s Acting Representative in the Syrian Arab Republic.

“FAO believes that this holistic strategy for agrifood system transformation is intended to contribute to achieving sustainability, wealth for urban and rural communities, food security, social equality, economic sustainability, opportunities creation and development for all. It will also have a positive impact on the natural resources and the environment as well,” He adds.

At this stage, FAO will discuss with MAAR, in addition to key ministries, representatives from the private sector, UN, INGOs and NGOs involved in agrifood systems, the initial results of the country context analysis of agri-food systems current situation and mobilizes all possible support from relevant stakeholders to finalize the analysis, which forms the basis to participatorily craft the national strategy for agrifood system transformation in Syria.