Activities listed on this page:
Asian highlights
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Regional cotton integrated pest management (IPM) programme |
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Regional vegetable integrated pest management (IPM) programme |
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Special Programme for Food Security |
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Biosafety for sustainable agriculture |
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Food insecurity and vulnerabilty information and mapping system |
Pacific highlights
Asian highlights
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Regional cotton integrated pest management (IPM) programme
(GCP/RAS/164/EC)
The FAO-EU IPM Programme for Cotton in Asia
concluded its activities in late 2004. Follow-up funding
is being pursued.
Funded by the European Union and implemented by FAO, participating countries include Bangladesh,
China, India, Pakistan, the Philippines and Viet Nam. The approximately 19 million cotton
farmers in these countries produce almost half of the world's cotton. However,
more pesticides are used on cotton than on any other crop – in some countries
more than 50 percent of all pesticides – causing severe environmental and health problems.
Reducing much of the US$1 500 million spent each year on cotton pesticides in Asia
can bring savings to farmers and governments. Detoxifying existing pest control
strategies and replacing them with a more sustainable and environmentally friendly
cotton production system was the major goal of this EU-FAO cooperation with the
participating countries.
To achieve the programme objectives, the country projects concentrated their
efforts on educating cotton farmers about the cotton ecosystem and how to verify
and further develop environmentally friendly pest control strategies. The biggest
challenge for the project was how to bring high quality education to
large numbers of farmers, each having only a small plot of cotton. Like any technique,
the new pest and production management skills need to be repeatedly practised by
farmers under the guidance of an expert facilitator – be it an extension agent or a
fellow farmer – until they are mastered independently. This was carried out in training
sessions called Farmer Field Schools (FFS), which formed the core of the cotton IPM
programme. To achieve and maintain high quality farmer education, extension agents
and fellow farmers were extensively trained in training of facilitator courses.
More information is available at
www.cottonipmasia.org.
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Regional vegetable integrated pest management (IPM) programme
Since 2002, eight South and Southeast Asian countries (Bangladesh, Cambodia,
China, Indonesia, Lao PDR, the Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam) are participating
in an FAO assisted five-year integrated pest management (IPM) programme, co-financed
by the governments of Australia, the Netherlands and Norway for a total amount of
$7.5 million.
The project aims at drastically reducing pesticide use in vegetable production and
increasing incomes of farmers. Through participatory farmers training and research,
the project concentrates on major pests and diseases in crops such as cabbage, kale,
tomato, eggplant, potato, cucumber, gourds and beans.
The project will create or strengthen groups of smallholder vegetable farmers to
carry out ecologically-based vegetable production and marketing. It will also
institute sustainable arrangements for the solution of technical crop production
and protection problems, and enhance the capabilities of government agencies and
non-governmental organizations to carry out IPM training and field activities.
Lessons learned will be used for policy advice to national governments on
better policies in the field of farmer education, crop protection, rural development
and poverty alleviation.
The regional IPM vegetables programme is stationed at the FAO Regional Office for Asia
and the Pacific in Bangkok. Its activities are carried out in close collaboration with
other regional and local IPM-related projects in Asia.
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Special Programme for Food Security (SPFS)
The activities of a cluster of national SPFS projects in Bangladesh, Lao PDR,
Indonesia and Sri Lanka, funded by the Government of Japan, are coordinated by the
SPFS Asia Regional Coordination Programme.
The overall goal of the regional SPFS project in Asia is to ensure that all
people in the countries involved have access at all times to the food they
need for a healthy, active life and to alleviate poverty
by increasing agricultural production per unit area as well as ensuring stability
in year-to-year production, on an economically viable and environmentally
sustainable basis.
The immediate objective of the SPFS Asia Coordination Component
is to facilitate smooth and successful implementation of the project
field activities by deploying three experts
in support of regional SPFS activities. They will provide technical and
administrative backstopping services in a coordinated manner and assist
the respective FAO Representatives in the management of donor inputs.
All projects are at different stages of implementation, but clear results
at the grassroots level are emerging already, as evidenced by the reports
of recent evaluation missions.
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Biosafety for sustainable agriculture (GCP/RAS/185/JPN)
A sustained increase in farm productivity is vital for the region, home to three-fourths
of the world's farm households. A new generation of technologies holds great potential of
not only boosting output, but also of reducing production costs, increasing nutritional
value and making agroprocessing more efficient. However, modern biotechnology,
especially genetically modified organisms (GMOs), has to be handled with great
caution to avoid potential risks to human and ecosystem health. Keen to unlock
the tremendous potential of agricultural biotechnology, countries in the region are
at different stages of GMO research and development.
Aware of the importance of
biosafety checks and national capacities to scientifically assess and manage the
benefits and risks associated with GMOs, ten countries (Bangladesh, China, India,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Viet Nam) are
collaborating with FAO in a four-year regional programme funded by Japan for the
safe harnessing of biotechnology in accordance with relevant global agreements.
Cooperating agencies include the Asia Pacific Association of Agricultural Research Institutions
(APAARI), United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO),
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD),
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Rockefeller Foundation,
Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences (JIRCAS),
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and
Global Environment Facility (GEF).
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Food insecurity and vulnerability information and mapping system (FIVIMS)
The assessment and monitoring of food insecurity is of paramount importance
for development planning and for directing efforts and resources to combat
undernourishment, hunger and poverty in Asia. In November 1996 the World Food
Summit (WFS), hosted by FAO in Rome, recognized the need for an assessment of
the extent of hunger and undernourishment, including at a subnational level, in
order for member states and international organizations to adequately plan and
mobilize their efforts and resources to meet the WFS challenge of halving the
number of undernourished by 2015.
To achieve the objective, the WFS requested through its Plan of
Action that each government develop and periodically update, where necessary,
a national Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Information and Mapping System (FIVIMS),
indicating areas and populations affected by or at risk of hunger and undernutrition,
and factors contributing to food insecurity, making maximum use of existing data and
other information systems to avoid duplication of efforts. The WFS also
called upon FAO to play a catalytic role within the UN family.
In response to the call, FAO implemented the Japan-funded Trust Fund project – known
as the Asia FIVIMS project – in
January 1998 as a primary input
and to provide technical support to the overall FIVIMS initiative, as well as to assess
food insecurity and vulnerability in Asia. The overall
development objective is to identify the most food insecure and vulnerable
populations so that countries can take appropriate actions and formulate
targeted policies and programmes to improve the food security and nutritional
status of the affected population and livelihood groups. This is achieved
through the development of effective food insecurity and vulnerability information
and mapping systems that help answer the basic FIVIMS questions – "Who are food
insecure and vulnerable?", "Where are they?", "Why are they food insecure and
vulnerable?" and "How many are they?".
Initially, the project supported five selected countries –
Bangladesh, Cambodia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand.
However, it will also explore the possibilities of extending its support
to other countries in Asia, and to gradually shift efforts and resources
to ASEAN countries.
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Conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic
resources for food and agriculture (GCP/RAS/JPN/186)
Seven countries (Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka,
Thailand and Viet Nam) are participating in the regional project,
funded by Japan, for the implementation of the global plan of action (GPA) for the
conservation and sustainable utilization of plant genetic resources for food and
agriculture (PGRFA).
The immediate objectives of the project are: to assist
participating countries in assessing the current status of PGRFA in order to fill
information gaps in each of the participating countries and to identify their needs
and priorities for the conservation and sustainable utilization of PGRFA within the
framework of the GPA; to improve national capacity in monitoring PGRFA activities within
the framework of the GPA by empowering them with tools for leading efficient
decision-making processes; to evaluate and develop PGRFA policies at the national level;
and to share successful experiences in the implementation of GPA
priority activity areas related to in situ conservation and on-farm management and
to improve national capacity in carrying out PGRFA in situ conservation and on-farm
management.
Very good progress towards achieving the immediate objectives has been made since
the project became operational in May 2003. The project is well targeted for the final
outputs, which include the establishment of a National Information Sharing Mechanism
on GPA implementation and the preparation of a finalized comprehensive report on the
state of implementation of the GPA in the participating countries to be made available also to
interested parties. For more information and detailed project activities, please
contact N. Quat Ng, Chief
Technical Advisor of the project based at the FAO regional office in Bangkok.
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ASIACOVER (TCP/RAS/2904)
The standards of qualitative, quantitative and spatial information on the present
status of land cover and land use are very heterogeneous in the Southeast Asian
region in terms of land cover classification, mapping scales and projections,
accuracies and the reference years of the maps. These inconsistencies hamper
appropriate planning for sustainable management of natural resources at national
and regional levels. Consistent information is particularly necessary to monitor
land cover changes over time in support of international conventions related to climate
change, biological diversity and desertification. Six countries (Cambodia, China,
Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand and Viet Nam) have joined the FAO funded
ASIACOVER
project to collect and standardize existing land cover and land use
information, to identify gaps where such information is missing and to develop
a strategy to fill these gaps in the future in the context of the joint FAO-UNEP
initiative to establish a Global Land Cover Network. Special attention is given
to spatially available socio-economic parameters to be combined with biophysical
data to facilitate analysis, planning and decision-making in favour of
food security and sustainable agriculture. A regional map and database, as well as
a network of practically trained data holders able to maintain and update them,
will be the most important project outcomes.
ASIACOVER's purpose is to improve access to and integrated use of spatial data and
information, to promote multidisciplinary approaches to sustainable development
and to enhance understanding of the benefits of geographic information. ASIACOVER
allows for the easy sharing of geographically referenced thematic information between
different organizations. For more information, please contact:
ASIACOVER@fao.org.
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Afghanistan
The rehabilitation and development of the agricultural sector in Afghanistan is
another major aspect of FAO's support in this region, particularly with respect
to irrigation, livestock and seed production. The transfer of operational
responsibilities from the FAO regional office to the country office,
which took place in January 2004, is expected to increase the efficiency and
improve dialogue with various development partners based in the country. FAO
has now concentrated its technical assistance for the rehabilitation and
sustainable development of the agriculture sector, which has been provided under an
active and dynamic FAO technical cooperation programme in the country. Currently,
FAO has a development programme of over 16 operational projects (excluding emergency
projects) with a total budget of US$44 million. The majority of the projects are
funded by various donors.
FAO set up the Improved
Seed Enterprise to produce outstanding local varieties of wheat
seed with increased yields. FAO continues to work on
strengthening national seed production capacity
and developing a sustainable seed programme in southern Afghanistan.
FAO also provides
technical assistance in the livestock sector through projects for developing
sustainable agricultural
livelihoods in Eastern Hazarajat, training of rural
families and technical staff to extend proven animal health and livestock
production packages, development of livestock production
activities and development
of rural poultry. FAO also operates several projects in
the irrigation sector, which include the community-based irrigation infrastructure
rehabilitation
and institutional strengthening of the water resources and irrigation
subsector in the western region of Afghanistan and an emergency
irrigation rehabilitation project. In addition,
a project for food and agriculture information
management aims to strengthen the Food, Agriculture
and Animal Husbandry Information Management and Policy unit (FAAHM) – established by FAO within
the Ministry
of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry in July 2003.
In partnership with the international donor community, FAO has
launched a Special Programme for Food Security (SPFP) in
Afghanistan to address
the growing imbalances between production and consumption of staple foods
in the country through farmer participation and the use of improved
production technologies that will remove the bottlenecks to increased
production. Several FAO technical cooperation programme (TCP) projects
are or will be implemented in the country, such as promoting
institutional and human resources capacity of government institutions in
the agriculture and rural sector. FAO has also provided and is committed to
providing further assistance in the forestry and horticultural sectors.
FAO is seeking more opportunities to further expand its development programme
in Afghanistan in close collaboration with the donor community and UN sister
agencies to assist Afghanistan in achieving and sustaining long-term
agricultural and economic recovery and growth.
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Bay of Bengal large marine ecosystem programme (BOBLME)
The Bay of Bengal has been identified as one of the world's sixty-four
large marine ecosystems (LMEs). Located in the monsoon belt, it
is bounded by eight countries (Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Malaysia,
Maldives, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand). The southern part of the Bay
merges into the Indian Ocean. About one-quarter of the world's population
resides in the littoral countries of the Bay of Bengal, with approximately
400 million living in the Bay’s catchment area, many subsisting at or below
the poverty level. An average of 65 percent of the region’s urban population lives
in large coastal cities and migration towards the coastal regions is increasing.
Recognizing the need for integrated and coordinated management of their coastal
and near-shore living marine resources, the eight countries bordering the Bay of
Bengal supported FAO's development and submission to the Global Environment
Facility (GEF), under the International Waters portfolio, of a proposal for a project
to pursue an LME approach. The GEF approved a PDF Block B grant to develop the BOBLME
programme with FAO as the executing agency. The Swedish International Development Agency
(SIDA) also strongly endorsed the BOBLME programme and allocated substantial funds
to support the development phase.
The PDF Block B development phase has been completed, during which national and
regional coordinating mechanisms were put in place to ensure
broad-based participation in the development of the transboundary diagnostic
analysis and in the preparation of a strategic action plan. The BOBLME
programme will ultimately provide a comprehensive framework for and identify the
specific actions required to address the priority transboundary problems.
Potential national and regional investment, technical assistance and
capacity building interventions will be identified to improve the management
of the living marine resources, with an initial focus on fisheries, and of the
health of the BOBLME as a whole for the continued sustainable use of the bay by
future generations.
The BOBLME programme’s (PDF Block B Phase) main components included the establishment
of national and regional coordination mechanisms; the synthesis and assessment of
existing information on the status of living marine resources in general, and fisheries
in particular, and of the environment in the BOBLME; the identification of transboundary
issues that threaten these resources and the health of the ecosystem; and
recommendations to address and mitigate these problems through coordinated
action. More information is available at:
http://www.fao.org/fi/boblme/website/index.htm.
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Pacific highlights
Over the years, FAO has increasingly recognized the importance
of adopting a regional
approach to food security in the Pacific island countries to address
common problems such as low productivity of subsistence agriculture; critical gaps
in technology transfer and adoption of modern techniques and inputs; poor market
integration of producers and consumers; the decline in traditional agricultural
export earnings; low human resource development and institutional capacity in
research, extension, policy and trade; and low awareness of World Trade Organization
(WTO) related issues
and protocols.
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Support for the regional programme for food security
(RPFS) in Pacific island countries (GTFS/RAS/189/ITA)
The three-year project, funded by the Government of Italy,
started late in 2003 to support 14 Pacific island countries
(Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall
Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands,
Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu). The project has two main components: 1)
enhancing food production and security, which focuses on specific production
(supply side) related activities; and 2) strengthening agricultural trade and
policy by building institutional capacity in trade facilitation
related to the establishment of sanitary and phytosanitary standards for agricultural
exports. The project strategy promotes partnerships and close collaboration with
CROP (Council of Regional Organizations in the Pacific) agencies, in particular
the University of the South Pacific (USP), the Secretariat of the Pacific
Community (SPC) and other institutional counterparts of FAO on activities of
common interest and related to food security. One such example is the
the EU development
of sustainable agriculture project, in partnership with SPC.
In addition to providing technical backstopping through its multidisciplinary
technical staff, FAO has organized a mechanism to ensure daily technical assistance
under its South-South Cooperation Programme with the Government of the People's
Republic of China and the Government of the Philippines. Through this arrangement,
up to a total of 52 technicians and 8 experts will be fielded in 13 Pacific island countries.
Technicians and experts will cover the fields of crop intensification, water
management, fisheries and livestock.
The regional project management unit responsible for running the
whole programme is based at the FAO Subregional Office
for the Pacific Islands (SAPA) in Apia, Samoa.
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Meeting plant protection needs in the twenty-first
century (PestNet) (TCP/RAS/2909)
Due to their geographic isolation and fragmentation, farmers in Pacific island
countries face difficulties in accessing information in general and on pests
and diseases in particular. Specific problems include inadequately resourced
extension services and a lack of internal communication, as well as a lack of taxonomic
expertise for pest identification. New approaches are required to improve access
to and quality of information adapted to farmers' needs. Fourteen countries are
collaborating in the FAO-funded Pacific PestNet project:
Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands,
Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and
Vanuatu. PestNet facilitates the identification of pests and diseases by
means of digital photos that are linked to existing databases, such as Ecoport (global plant pest database).
Relevant training on pest identification and database management are provided.
The project's immediate objectives are to: 1) determine how to effectively address
farmers' plant protection needs; 2) use digital technologies to enhance delivery
of pest diagnoses to farmers; and 3) train plant protection personnel from 14
FAO member countries on the use of Ecoport as a resource for pest identification, control
measures and pest risk analysis.
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Strengthening coastal fisheries legislation (TCP/RAS/2907)
Coastal fisheries resources in the Pacific region are being depleted due to
population growth, overfishing and the use of illegal and destructive fishing methods.
The depletion is a threat to the food security of the island communities whose
livelihoods depend significantly on coastal fisheries. The non-traditional utilization
of the coastal marine area for aquaculture activities and the extraction of aquarium
fish and other aquatic animals for export underline the need for a more sustainable use
of coastal resources and to introduce issues such as fish health management.
The governments of Kiribati, Marshall Islands, the Federated
States of Micronesia, Nauru and Palau have joined hands in an FAO-funded project
for strengthening coastal fisheries legislation. The objective of the project is
to strengthen the capacity of national legislation drafters and fisheries experts
in issues, trends and concerns of community-based fisheries and co-management of
inshore and coastal fisheries and aquaculture, as well as fish health management
to further develop their own country's legislative framework.
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Pacific study to evaluate the benefits and costs of
World Trade Organization membership
Recent changes in the international trade regime, arising from the Uruguay
Round (UR) of the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs (GATT) and the establishment
of the World Trade Organization (WTO), have placed new demands on the small island
countries in the Pacific. Furthermore, access to overseas markets for
agriculture and food are limited and restricted as the market becomes more rigorous.
While the UR agreement presents opportunities as well as challenges for all WTO members,
there has been no study of the impact on agriculture and food trade specifically for the
small island countries in the Pacific. Nine Pacific countries (Cook Islands,
Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu)
participated in an FAO-funded project to conduct such a study.
The results have provided reliable information for the preparation of policy decisions
on agricultural trade and the implications of membership in the WTO.
The assistance filled a critical gap in ongoing decision processes with direct
relevance for production and income of producers in the region.
In addition to the intercountry programmes, a growing number of national projects
are being implemented in Pacific island countries. In eight Pacific countries,
11 FAO projects funded during 2003 provided technical or emergency assistance.
For example, assistance was given to Fiji for improving the handling and marketing
of fresh vegetables and fruits. The project provided the necessary resources and
expertise to build three packing shed facilities and to train national staff on
post-harvest handling and packaging of horticultural produce. The Government is
now using its own funds to replicate the packaging sheds in 72 other areas of
the country. Assistance was given to the Fiji College of Agriculture to develop
a training module for inclusion in the curriculum of its Certificate of
Agricultural Training course. Through a project for development of seaweed farming,
Tonga was assisted in improving the technology of "sea farmers" who are collecting
Mozuku seaweed for export. In addition, a market study was conducted to explore other
export markets for their produce. |
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