Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue has met with the head of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations Qu Dongyu at the UN Food Systems pre-summit in Rome.

In March, the two met virtually to launch the FAO + Ireland: Partnering for a peaceful, equal and sustainable world report, which detailed Ireland’s involvement in FAO projects overseas.

Speaking on the proceedings of Tuesday’s meeting with the director general of the FAO, the Minister stated that the food systems approach to food security and human nutrition was discussed over the course of the meeting, also commenting on the centrality of this approach to his Department’s new Food Vision 2030 strategy.

“Ireland has a long tradition of working with [the] FAO to achieve our common goal of improving food security and nutrition for all – central to this being our farmers who produce world-class, safe food,” said Minister McConalogue.

“We are agreed that this can be done by taking a food systems approach to food production and consumption, recognising the interconnections between policies for food, health, environment and climate,” he added.

Food programme

The Minister attended a meeting with UN World Food Programme (WFP) executive director David Beasley.

Some 100 million people in 88 countries are helped by the programme, which delivers food provisions to disaster-stricken areas affected by hunger.

“Ireland always stands shoulder to shoulder with the World Food Programme, providing the best kind of flexible funding that enables us to respond quickly in areas where aid is needed most, and we saw that most recently during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the WFP head stated.

Roundtable discussion

The Minister also participated in a roundtable discussion with other agricultural ministers to discuss the topic of transforming food systems.

He reiterated Ireland’s commitment to ensuring the UN Food Systems Summit in New York this September proceeds successfully, as well as expressing his continued support for the UN sustainable development goals which seek to reduce suffering worldwide.