1.4 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Sub-Regional Representative for Southern and Eastern Africa 

It is my great pleasure to welcome everybody to this Workshop in Harare, Zimbabwe. You have been here for some days, so I am sure even those of you who may be here for the first time are now a little familiar with the country. 

The purpose of the workshop and this part of the workshop in particular is "Guidelines for Environmentally sound Tillage Practices for the Protection of the Soil" and, the farmer. 

This is an expert consultation on International Conservation Tillage, and I know many more people wanted to attend but could not because the preparation were initially made for only 45 people and this number has nearly been doubled for various technical reasons. If therefore you find some logistical problems, please bear with us. The idea was to accommodate as many as possible so we can get as much input as possible to make the recommendations representative. This makes it easy to follow up. 

At a time like this when everybody is trying to cut costs but increase production in order to feed more people, a programme like this is most welcome, but I have always wondered though, why farmers insist on using the expensive methods. 

Talk about conservation on tillage has been around for over three decades - I hope among your findings will be reasons for the slow or lack of adoption in this part of the world, so that if it is to be promoted now, it is accepted and adopted by the ultimate user - the farmer. 

As for the women farmers not being represented, I find it very unusual - fortunately the organisers, ZFU, noticed it first, so let us hope this was a temporary lapse and we shall not have to organise separate but similar workshops and networks for women farmers. This aspect was actually commented on at the UN Economic Commission for Africa recently held in Addis Ababa when it was minuted and I quote "It is an economic imperative for Africa to invest in African women" otherwise the heralded African "renaissance" will come to nought and African women will not be in a position to continue feeding the continent. 

With these comments, I wish you successful deliberations.