Egypt’s Minister of Environment Yasmine Fouad said, on Saturday, that achieving food stability and sustainability requires the integration of the three Rio conventions, which focus on biological diversity, climate change, and desertification.
The minister also highlighted the importance of food sustainability issues, especially in light of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Fouad highlighted the need to take effective and urgent measures to achieve food security and the sustainability of food systems.
The minister’s remarks came during a speech at the preparatory ministerial meeting for the 2021 United Nations Food Summit. The meeting will be held at the heads of state and leaders level at the UN headquarters in New York in September.
The summit aims to take urgent measures to transform food systems into sustainable and resilient systems, in light of major global environmental crises.
At the same time, this would mean: maintaining the sustainability of using natural resources; mitigating the negative effects of food systems on the environment; and addressing the issues of biodiversity loss, climate change, desertification and land degradation.
Fouad reviewed the pivotal issues in food sustainability, including reformulation of the procedures and the governance system of the three Rio conventions.
This would act as a way of better serving the transition to sustainable food systems, while enhancing the role and importance of ecosystem-based approaches.
The minister also highlighted the need to move towards more sustainable and resilient food systems in order to adapt to climate change.
This is in addition to working to provide the necessary financial resources, which constitute one of the most important challenges facing the three agreements and the process of transforming food systems.
The minister called for the need to take measures that would enable all member states of the three conventions to transform local initiatives and communities to be more resilient and able to withstand climate changes.
