Bilateral meeting with The Honorable Todd McClay, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry, Hunting and Fishing and Trade, and Associate Minister of Foreign Affairs, of New Zealand

Lima, Peru – The FAO Director-General, QU Dongyu, and The Honorable Todd McClay, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry, Hunting and Fishing and Trade, and Associate Minister of Foreign Affairs, of New Zealand met on the margins of APEC Ministerial Meeting in Lima.

The Minister expressed appreciation for the meeting with the Director-General and mentioned his recent visit to FAO headquarters.

The Director-General raised a number of key topics of common interest, emphasizing the importance of true cost of food, and the hidden costs of the agrifood systems that should be take into consideration for improved production and enhanced support to famers and producers. In this regard, the Director-General expanded on joint efforts to reduce food loss and waste one area with high impact at scale for improving food security, and more focus on innovative and efficient ways to produce more with less.

The Minister mentioned that New Zealand looks at newly developed technologies for ensuring efficiency in production, and solutions to lower emissions and reducing negative impact on the environment.

The Director-General elaborated the importance of working on sustainable transformation of the livestock sector and invited New Zealand to share their successful practices and experiences with other countries.