COP29 HIGH-LEVEL PARTY EVENT Cutting Carbon, Adapting Food Systems and Restoring Nature on the Path to 1.5C

Your Excellency the President of Ethiopia

Your Excellency the Prime Minister Denmark

Your Excellencies, Ministers from the United Arab Emirates, Azerbaijan and Egypt,

Excellences,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Dear Colleagues,

Today’s event confirms that transformation to more efficient, more inclusive, more resilient and more sustainable global agrifood systems is increasingly recognized as key to achieving the Paris Agreement and the SDGs.

Every year, countries in the climate convention tell us how the climate crisis severely affects their agrifood systems.

Farmers live on the frontlines of the climate crisis, and all too often they are among the 730 million people facing hunger today.

Agrifood systems transformation holds solutions for the climate crisis and the interlinked challenges of food, water, land and biodiversity.

FAO has worked closely with the COP Presidencies to bring across this message, and to take action.

COP27 in Egypt launched the Food and Agriculture for Sustainable Transformation (FAST) Partnership to increase the quantity and quality of climate finance for food and agriculture.

At COP28, 160 Heads of State and Government signed the UAE Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems and Climate Action.

Through our presence on the ground in over 130 countries, FAO has the technical capacity to support implementation of this groundbreaking declaration into action on the ground through existing programmes.

Today at COP29, FAO welcomes the Baku Harmoniya Climate Initiative for Farmers.

FAO is proud to host the initiative as part of the FAST Partnership, and we welcome Azerbaijan and Egypt as co-chairs.

Together with partners, through our collective expertise and experience, we look forward to working with the COP29 Presidency to achieve the objectives of Harmoniya, which are in line with FAO’s vision for the transformation of global agrifood systems to be more efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable,

For the Four Betters: better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life – leaving no one behind.

And it provides added impetus for climate action in support of global food security.

To support smallholder farmers and producers with agrifood systems solutions, we need enabling policies, innovation and technologies.

We need more financing and investment that reaches agricultural communities, we need to leverage private investments, and to help repurpose agricultural investments.

We need agrifood systems integrated into national plans and prioritized in multilateral environmental agreements. Every Nationally Determined Contribution should reflect the full potential of climate action from agrifood system transformation.

At COP25 in Madrid, together with six other UN Principals, we convened for the first time an open dialogue on how to turn the tide on deforestation and emphasized the need for transformational change to address food security, agriculture and forestry, working together through a holistic approach.  

Building on the momentum from one COP to the next, FAO proposes to reconvene at COP30 to assess progress, and look forward together how to speed up and scale up efforts to halt forest loss and sustainable management of biodiversity.

Excellences,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Today’s event unites four COP Presidencies, each committed to coherence and continuity with the COP-to COP mechanism,

And FAO continues to be committed to supporting this mechanism to reinforce the message that agrifood systems are the climate solution because, when transformed, they will be able to effectively contribute to cutting carbon and restoring nature on the path to 1.5-degrees Celsius.

The transformation of global agrifood systems will also ensure food availability, food accessibility and food affordability, which are the three critical components to ensuring food security for all.

Thank you.