The meeting is part of a series of meetings planned to present the World Programme for the Census of Agriculture 2010 to the FAO member countries in different regions.

Purpose
The meeting aimed to disseminate among the selected member countries of FAO from near east region the new World Programme for the Census of Agriculture 2010 which will cover the period 2006–2015. The roundtable is organized with the objective of helping the participants gain a deeper understanding of the new strategy of adopting a modular approach to data collection being advocated by FAO through this new Programme. Plans of the countries for implementing the next round of agricultural census and surveys will also be reviewed.

Participants
The participants of the meeting are the professional statisticians and census leaders who are likely to play a role in the planning and execution of agricultural census in their respective countries during the decade to which the Programme pertains (2006–2015). A total of 17 countries and some international organization have been invited to the meeting. The invited countries include Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syrian Arab Republic, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Morocco, Palestine, Occupied Tr. and Tunisia.

Main source document for the meeting

  World Programme for the Census of Agriculture (WCA 2010)

Technical documents