Agriculture Minister Calls on UN Organizations to Help Revive Syria’s Agricultural Sector
Rome-The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) ended its 34th Regional Conference for the Near East and North Africa at FAO Headquarters in Rome with the participation of 26 countries including Syria.
The five-day conference was attended by 144 participants representing 26 countries, including 4 observers, 6 international non-governmental organizations, 5 intergovernmental organizations, two private sector organizations, 6 civil society organizations and 5 United Nations organizations.
Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform, Eng. Ahmad Al-Qadri, pointed out in a speech during the conference to the importance of the agricultural sector in Syria and the systematic destruction and sabotage it was exposed to and the negative effects of unilateral economic sanctions on this sector.
Mr. Al-Qadri denounced the Turkish government’s cooperation with the Qatari Red Crescent to launch the “protection project” for some Syrian wheat varieties as a flagrant violation of the international obligations that safeguard the rights of countries in their resources and contravene the seven principles governing the work of National Societies within the International Movement of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies which don’t allow the Qatari Red Crescent to operate in any country without this country’s permission.
The Minister of Agriculture called on the UN organizations to make additional efforts to assist in the re-development of the agricultural sector by supporting farmers and the inclusion of priority institutional support projects that provide services to affected farmers and breeders, support the livestock and fisheries sector and scientific research centers, which are the main pillars of the development of the agricultural sector.
On the sidelines of the conference, Mr. Al-Qadri also met with the Director-General of the World Organization, a number of his deputies and some concerned department managers in the Department of Economic and Social Development, “Water and Land”, Plant and Animal Production, and Agriculture Ministers in Tunisia, Iran, Palestine, Sudan and Lebanon.
Sh. Kh.