The activities of the fourth meeting of the Ministers of Agriculture of Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria kicks off at the Dama Rose Hotel
On March 26th, the fourth meeting of the Ministers of Agriculture of Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria kicked off at the Dama Rose Hotel in Damascus.
The Minister of Agriculture, Eng. Mohamed Hassan Qatna, said in a speech during the meeting: “We have culminated our previous efforts by signing a memorandum of understanding for cooperation in the agricultural field, which is a starting point towards a better future for the brotherly Arab countries.”
Qatna added: “We conducted closed sessions in which we discussed how organizations can increase our funding in order to follow up on the implementation of projects in the four countries.”
In turn, the Jordanian Minister of Agriculture, Khaled Al-Hanifat, affirmed that the relationship between the brothers in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan branch out to include social, cultural, commercial, political and agricultural relations that are rooted in blood and transcend time and borders.
Al-Hanifat said that the dangers that threaten us all are the same, and they result from the challenges of climate change, the Covid crisis, and the Russian-Ukrainian war that affected food security in our countries.
For his part, the Iraqi Minister of Agriculture, Abbas Al-Alaywi, affirmed that agricultural integration between our countries is an inevitable necessity with the worsening challenges of climate change and successive crises that affected grain supplies and food prices.
Al-Alaywi said: “We are on the verge of enhancing trade exchange, facilitating the flow of agricultural commodities, setting frameworks and understandings for the exchange of competencies, and developing technical cooperation in the agricultural and animal sectors.”
In his turn, the Lebanese Minister of Agriculture, Abbas Hajj Hassan, said: “Our food security is a priority over all other files, and because we believe that we are a nation capable of making the future, we are here to put all capabilities in order to make this joint Arab effort a success.”
Director General of the Arab Center for the Studies of Arid Zones and Dry Lands(ACSAD), Dr. Nasr Al-Din Al-Obaid said that the center makes a serious and effective contribution to the development of Arab agriculture and implements pioneering development projects in most Arab countries.
The two-day meeting of ministers will discuss the results reached in the quadripartite meetings held during the past year in Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan, ways to enhance trade exchange and food security, mechanisms to support regional projects, confront climate challenges and land degradation, and improve agricultural production in the four countries.
The meetings will also include dialogue sessions, a presentation of the strategies of the agricultural sector and the agricultural calendar of the four countries, and the signing of a memorandum of understanding in the agricultural field, followed by a day visit to research and scientific centers specialized in the agricultural sector.
The previous quadripartite meetings were held three times during the past year, in February in Iraq, in July in Lebanon, and in September in Jordan.
- al-Mohammad