Science Technology and Innovation Digital Conference

 

 

 

Science Technology and Innovation Digital Conference

Session on “Rethinking Global STI Cooperation post-COVID-19. What are the next steps?”

Carla Mucavi, Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the United Nations in New York

I would like to congratulate the organizers for promoting this conference. And I would like to thank the speakers for their presentations today.

Yesterday, we discussed the use of STI in the COVID-19 response. This also applies to food and agriculture. Let me give two examples. E-commerce platforms help connect farmers to consumers while respecting measures put in place to contain the spread of the disease. FAO also created an open-access big data tool on COVID-19 impact on food chains.

STI is helping us to address global challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic and, after COVID-19, it will contribute to the much-needed transformation of agriculture and food systems to sustainably feed the world’s growing population.

From ending poverty and hunger to responding to climate change and sustaining our natural resources, food and agriculture lies at the heart of the 2030 Agenda. And science, technology and innovation is indispensable for achieving a world free from hunger and malnutrition.

STI allows us to build sustainable agriculture and food systems that produce more food, of greater nutritional value, reduce food loss and waste and achieve this with least environmental damage.

It is central to the use of agroecological approaches, conservation and sustainable use of agricultural biodiversity, improvement of nutrition, combatting antimicrobial resistance, increasing crop, livestock and aquatic animal health, sustainable intensification of production systems, and more.

STI applications include climate-smart technologies in agri-food systems that help countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change.

This session focuses on rethinking Global STI Cooperation post-COVID-19, what are the next steps. I want to add to my response by  looking at some specific ways FAO is using STI today.

First, last year, FAO launched the Hand-in-Hand Initiative, an evidence-based, country-led initiative, that uses big data and geospatial information systems to identify needs and agricultural potential, propose tailor-made responses, and match donors with recipient countries. The ultimate goal is to accelerate progress towards SDG 1 and SDG 2, and it does so with a paradigm shift, truly bringing together expertise from within and outside the organization, offering a service that can be used by others in different contexts as well. STI is central to this effort, as it allows the platform to function, the exchange that it generates, and provides concrete solutions that are needed.

Second, STI is critical to the ongoing, but still underfunded, response to the worst desert locust outbreak in recent decades. The FAO E-Locust suite of tools collects real time information, which is analyzed together with weather, habitat and satellite data to assess the situation and to provide six-week forecasts. As such, STI is key to understanding and anticipating needs. Partners in developing these and other tools include Penn State and Cambridge University, Garmin, NASA and the Gates Foundation. Going forward, the innovative use of STI and development of new partnerships that clearly contribute to the goals we want to reach should the rule and not the exception, be it in food and agriculture, emergency response or in other areas of sustainable development.

Third, FAO is facilitating STI initiatives in the agri-food sector to support global STI cooperation. I will give you specific examples. We are enabling a global network of Digital Agriculture and Innovation Hubs to empower rural innovators and agripreneurs in the innovation process in the agri-food sector. We are also supporting the creation of International Digital Council for Food and Agriculture, that will provide structured and strategic agricultural policy recommendations on digitalization to relevant stakeholders, and strengthen international cooperation in agri-food systems to identify the challenges and possible digital solutions.

Let me add that digital technologies offer unique opportunities for improving the agri-food system and achieving the SDGs. There is a promising future in digital technologies such as blockchain and artificial intelligence, Internet of Things etc., fueled by lower costs and increasing capacity in data applications.

Digital transformation in the agriculture sector can boost connectivity of all the actors in the agri-food system, including smallholders, and reduce this gap. However, this transformation must be managed carefully to avoid further widening of the ‘technology divide’ between countries and between those with differing abilities to adopt innovations.

In this context it is important that STI is accessible and affordable, responds to needs of small-scale producers, and considers traditional and indigenous knowledge. And that we make efforts to improve technological infrastructure, levels of literacy and skills, access to services, and reducing costs of technology and strengthening regulatory frameworks. To end, let me pose a question of the panelists. As we rethink Global STI Cooperation post-COVID-19, what are concrete ways that we can ensure multi-stakeholder participation in STI development and use, ensure it responds to national needs and use it in a way that bridges and not deepens the technology divide that exists today?

Thank you for your attention.