São Paulo – This week, representatives of Arab countries, including diplomats and researchers, will be Campina Grande, in the state of Paraíba, to discuss technologies for coexisting with the drought. The workshop Technologies for Coexistence in Arid and Semiarid Regions was scheduled to take place in April, but was postponed due to political issues in the Arab world, and will now be held from Wednesday (25) to Friday (27), at the Hotel Garden Convention Centre. The meeting is part of the initiatives of the Summit of South American-Arab Countries (Aspa).
According to the director of the National Institute of the Semiarid (Insa, in the Portuguese acronym), Roberto Germano Costa, so far, approximately 20 representatives of the Arab world have confirmed their attendance. They will come from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Syria and Jordan. From South America, aside from Brazil, there will be representatives of Argentina, Chile and Peru in attendance. According to Costa, the meeting will follow the dynamics that were in the program for the meeting in April: experiences will be exchanged regarding living in arid and semiarid regions.
The seminar will feature lectures by Brazilians and people from six other countries. Brazilian lecturers will include representatives of the National Water Agency (ANA), of the Semiarid Articulation (ASA) and of the Brazilian Ministry of Environment. As for other South American countries, people from the Argentinean Institute for Investigation of Arid Zones and from the Chilean National Forestry Corporation will speak.
Arab representatives due to speak will include representatives of the Institute of Arid Regions of Gabes, in Tunisia, of the Arab Centre for the Study on Arid Zones and Dry Lands (Acsad), in Syria, of the Ministry of State for Environmental Affairs, in Egypt, and of the National Centre for Agricultural Research and Extension (Ncare), in Jordan.
The participants will visit two experiences in the state of Paraíba. One of them will involve milk production in the municipality of Monteiro, in the Cariri Paraibano region. “It used to be the region with the lowest HDI (Human Development Index) in the state. Now it is the leading producer of goat milk in Brazil,” says Costa. They will also go to São João do Cariri to witness a desalination project in which residue are reused, and a visit will be paid to the desalination laboratory of the Federal University of Campina Grande.
The Aspa is a bi-regional cooperation mechanism established in 2005 by initiative of the then-president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The workshop in Campina Grande will be promoted by the Insa, the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Relations, the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC) and the Aspa. In 2010, the Insa was picked, at the 2nd International Conference on Climate, Sustainability and Development in Semiarid Regions, to centralize all cooperation in technologies for coexisting with drought within the Aspa.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
