Consultation Meeting for the Establishment of ?Consortium of Farmers Organizations? for West Asia and North Africa (WANA) ?CFO-WANA?
30/12/2011-31/12/2011
Consultation Meeting for the Establishment of ?Consortium of Farmers Organizations? for West Asia and North Africa (WANA) ?CFO-WANA?
Following two consecutive days of deliberations and discussions on 30-31 December 2011, the last day of the year has witnessed the birth of a new regional organization with the name COFO-WANA (Consortium of Farmers Organization in West Asia North Africa Region).
The establishment meeting, organized and sponsored by AARINANA in collaboration with FAO, GFAR and UPEHC was attended by nineteen leading representatives of farmers unions and associations from different countries of the region in addition to key representatives of the co-sponsors. Participating countries were Cyprus, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Sudan, Tunisia and Turkey.
In their opening speeches, the sharing representatives of the co-sponsor organizations Dr. Faisal Awawdeh (AARINAENA), Dr. Magdi Latif (FAO) and Dr. Assem Shaltout (UPEHC) identified the multiple challenges which face the agriculture sector in the region.
They commonly emphasized the importance of establishing the COFO-WANA for the major role it can play in regional cooperation and in reflecting the actual needs of the farming community for national and regional AR4D.
The countries status reports presented during the first day provided a wealth of information on different issues of mutual interest and concern. These presentations encouraged the participants to engage and interact in constructive discussions, without losing momentum, to exchange experiences on specific main topics, such as organizational structure, identifying farmers’ needs, solving problems related to transferring research results to farmers, empowering women farmers and linking farmers to markets. Therefore these proceedings are keeping accurate minutes of the meeting to provide background information for future actions of COFO-WANA as well as for potential donors to its activities. Some features of farmers’ organizations in the WANA region, derived from the status reports and discussions are:
The establishment meeting, organized and sponsored by AARINANA in collaboration with FAO, GFAR and UPEHC was attended by nineteen leading representatives of farmers unions and associations from different countries of the region in addition to key representatives of the co-sponsors. Participating countries were Cyprus, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Sudan, Tunisia and Turkey.In their opening speeches, the sharing representatives of the co-sponsor organizations Dr. Faisal Awawdeh (AARINAENA), Dr. Magdi Latif (FAO) and Dr. Assem Shaltout (UPEHC) identified the multiple challenges which face the agriculture sector in the region.
They commonly emphasized the importance of establishing the COFO-WANA for the major role it can play in regional cooperation and in reflecting the actual needs of the farming community for national and regional AR4D.
The countries status reports presented during the first day provided a wealth of information on different issues of mutual interest and concern. These presentations encouraged the participants to engage and interact in constructive discussions, without losing momentum, to exchange experiences on specific main topics, such as organizational structure, identifying farmers’ needs, solving problems related to transferring research results to farmers, empowering women farmers and linking farmers to markets. Therefore these proceedings are keeping accurate minutes of the meeting to provide background information for future actions of COFO-WANA as well as for potential donors to its activities. Some features of farmers’ organizations in the WANA region, derived from the status reports and discussions are:
- Limited financial resources, which come mainly from low membership fees. Some organizations are dependent on government subsidy, joint projects or donations to sustain their services. Some others, although non-profitable, run their operations as a small agribusiness venture with small mark up on supplies to farmers, which make them independent;
- All have the same objectives of protecting farmers rights and interests and providing necessary information for rural development to ensure better life conditions;
- Most rely on governmental experts or institutions in providing extension services. Few outsource foreign expertise from agriculture developed countries;
- Few have permanent technical staff;
- Very few organizations have secured pension and health care for their members;
- Some have very good experience in assisting farmers to access domestic and export markets;
- Some have very good experience in fostering partnership;
- Some have successful collaboration with counter organizations in the region; Some have advocacy and lobbying capacity as well as tactics which enable them to influence political decisions in favor of the farming community; All showed great interest in strengthening trade integration between the countries of the region;
- Markets and marketing data are not adequately available to most organizations and marketing is of major concern to all organizations;
- All organizations have great interest to lead their members to produce traceable safe food through regional training courses;
- All organizations indicated the need to train their members on GAP;
- With all attempts, some of which are successful, there is still a lot to be done to boost empowering women farmers in the region.
| Items | Download |
| Agenda | |
| List of Participants | |
| Proceedings of Expert Consultation Meeting for Establishing a “WANA Consortium for Farmers Organizations” | |
| Presentations | |
| Cyprus | |
| First Egypt | |
| Second Egypt | |
| Jordan | |
| Kuwait | |
| Lebanon | |
| Libya | |
| Palastine | |
| Sudan | |
| Tunisia | |
| Turkey | |
