FAO and Swiss Food & Nutrition Valley strengthen partnership to foster innovation in agrifood systems

The FAO Director-General, QU Dongyu, the President of SFNV’s Steering Committee, Marie-France Tschudin, and SFNV’s Chief Executive Officer, Christina Senn-Jakobsen, signed a Letter of Intent to create mechanisms to develop innovative solutions to address the root causes and mitigate the consequences of agrifood systems challenges that currently constrain progress.

Switzerland’s thriving food ecosystem is developing a wealth of innovations to tackle some of the most pressing global food challenges. FAO and SFNV will establish a closer collaboration in the areas of innovation, healthy diets and nutrition.

The new FAO-SFNV collaboration will focus on:

1. Innovative solutions: Creating a mechanism to identify, develop, refine, and scale innovative solutions in agrifood systems to contribute to healthy diets and nutrition.
2. Addressing healthy diets and nutrition: Targeting issues related to healthy diets for all, nutrition for the most vulnerable, safe food for everyone, and reducing food loss and waste.
3. Leveraging Swiss leadership: Drawing on Switzerland's strengths in science, technology, innovation business and sustainability to cultivate impactful and scalable solutions for agrifood systems.
4. Promoting inclusivity: Introducing solutions that can be implemented in Low- and Middle-Income Countries, benefiting marginalised groups including family farmers, cooperatives, and small and medium-sized enterprises.

Embarking on this new partnership, FAO Director-General QU Dongyu said "We are excited to embark on this collaboration with the Swiss Food & Nutrition Valley as it is an important partnership for us as we work together to ensure healthy diets and nutrition for all," Qu said. "By collaborating and leveraging innovative solutions and Swiss expertise, we can be more optimistic about some of the most pressing challenges currently facing global agrifood systems."

President of the SFNV Steering Committee, Marie-France Tschudin added "To future-proof our food systems, close collaboration between national and international actors is essential. Partnering with FAO will allow us to build bridges and scale solutions that not only tackle global nutrition challenges but also support sustainable development and inclusivity across diverse communities worldwide."

The Letter of Intent was signed at an event held at Agropole at Molondin, a Vaud-based campus dedicated to shaping the future of food. QU Dongyu, the FAO delegation and colleagues from Switzerland’s Federal Office for Agriculture exchanged with three leading Swiss startups and SFNV Valley partners - CleanGreens Solutions, Vivent Biosignals and Ecorobotix – and received first-hand experience of some Swiss innovative solutions.