H.E Dr. Muhammad Abdur Razzaque, Minister of Agriculture of the Government of Bangladesh attended, on a zoom platform, the Pre-Summit (Rome, 26-28, July,2021) of the UNFSS(UN Food Systems Summit, September,2021) alongwith over 500 delegates in-person and many more on a digital platform. He was invited to speak at the important Global Town Hall segment immediately after inaugural ceremony. Hon’ble Minister focused on, among others, Action Track 5 (AT5: Building Resilience to Vulnerabilities, Shocks and Stresses. H.E. Mr. Sadhan Chandra Majumder, Minister of Food also spoke digitally on Resilience on the second day. Md. Mesbahul Islam, Senior Secretary, Minister of Agriculture made a statement on a zoom at the platform :Transforming Food Systems for Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals: Rising to the Challenge. Italian Prime Minister H.E. Mr. Mario Draghi inaugurated the important event in-person while UN Secretary General Mr. Antonio Guterres joined digitally. Hon’ble Foreign Minister of Italy Mr. Luigi Di Maio and Deputy Secretary General of the UN H.E. Mrs. Amina J. Mohammed were present in person-both at the inaugural and closing ceremony.
H.E. Mr. Md. Shameem Ahsan, Bangladesh Ambassador to Italy and Permanent Representative to FAO, IFAD and WFP, was invited to make intervention at the segment 'Panel Discussion and Launch of Systemic, Transformative Coalitions of Action' on the concluding day (29 July,2021) on “Resilient Food Supply Chains”. Bangladesh is expected to play a lead role on the coalition on resilience issue, among others, leading upto the UNFSS, New York (September,2021) and beyond. Congratulations to the Honourable Ministers and the Senior Secretary for their valuable contributions. Their presentations were well received. Mr. Manash Mitra, Economic Counsellor and Alternate Permanent Representative(APR) to UN Agencies in Rome joined in person.
Held in partnership with the Government of Italy in a hybrid format due to covid-19, the Pre-Summit of the UN Food Systems Summit sets the stage for the culminating global event in September in New York,2021 by bringing together diverse actors from around the world to leverage the power of food systems to deliver progress on all 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The event confirms Italy's role as a world leader in food security and nutrition and as a key stakeholder in the preparatory process for the Food Systems Summit, also the host country of the UN Food Security Cluster Agencies.
