São Paulo – Next week in Brasília there will be a debate about agricultural cooperation with Africa. The meeting, promoted by the United Nations (UN) on May 17th and 18th, will focus on "South-South Agricultural Cooperation and Development in Africa” and will bring representatives of the civil society, governments of Africa and Brazil, organisations that operate in agriculture, press, thinkers and intellectuals to evaluate the results of cooperation developed by the country with the continent.
Between 2005 and 2009, Brazil increased funds turned to cooperation by 129%, from US$ 158 million a year to US$ 362 million. "We have been identifying growth, Brazil is positioning itself, but public discussion is not taking place,” said Francisco Filho, an advisor at the International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth (IPC-IG), of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
The idea of the meeting is to make this discussion arise in the Brazilian society. Francisco recalls that cooperation cannot solely focus on commercial ends and should also take into consideration matters like social policies and reduction of poverty. One of the debates should be whether the country is adopting a differential in cooperation or just reproducing what was done by developed nations.
At the meeting some experience of African countries will be presented, but the idea is for the panels not to take more than 15 minutes each and for greater time to be made available for talks. The four central points are: the part played by Brazil in cooperation for development; agricultural and inclusive development in Africa and Brazil; the influence of cooperation with Brazil in agriculture; the reduction of hunger and climate change in Africa; as well as the part played by Brazil and China in South-South cooperation.
As there will be participants from Africa, the meeting will also serve as a thermometer for how the Africans are reacting to cooperation. Most of the participants will be from Brazil, but also represented will be Ethiopia, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Malawi, Kenya, South Africa and Tanzania. There will also be presence of participants from China, the United Kingdom, France, Switzerland e Argentina.
The Forum should take place in the auditorium of the World Health Organisation and will be opened by Marco Farani, director of the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC), connected to the Brazilian Foreign Office (Itamaraty), and Jorge Chediek, resident coordinator of the United Nations System and UNDP Resident Representative in Brazil. The IPC-IG, which organizes the event, is a centre for knowledge whose objective is to promote closer South-South ties, both for dissemination of knowledge and for facilitation and development of experience.
Service
International Forum "South-South Agricultural Cooperation and Development in Africa"
Date: May 17th and 18th
Time: 9:30 am – 5:30 pm
Local: World Health Organisation Auditorium (OPAS/OMS) – Setor de Embaixadas Norte (SEN), Lote 19, Brasília – DF
http://www.ipc-undp.org/
*Translated by Mark Ament
