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Workshop on strengthening global agribusiness trade ends at TERI SAS
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Tuesday, 19 November, 2019, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Our Bureau, New Delhi
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The two-day international workshop on Strengthening International Agribusiness Trade: Stakeholder Dialogue and Partnerships Towards SDGs, concluded in New Delhi recently.
As the name suggests, its objectives were twofold: to prioritise action plan for strengthening international agribusiness trade from emerging countries to developed countries, and to initiate stakeholder dialogue and facilitate stakeholder partnerships between actors of food supply chains from developing and developed countries.
The workshop was organised by TERI School of Advanced Studies in collaboration with Global Centre for Land-Based Innovation- Western Sydney University, National Academy of Agricultural Research Management (NAARM) and National Agricultural Higher Education Project (NAHEP).
The second day of the conference began with a panel discussion on Building Sustainable Agri-Food Supply Chains, which focussed on capturing challenges and strengthening partnerships for sustainable food supply chains (e.g. from biosecurity, food safety, etc.)
It was noted that to address sustainable issues in the supply chain, vertical and horizontal collaborations among supply chain actors must be addressed through lowered supply chain waste and agility. This can be accomplished through digital connectedness, trust-based relationships and availability of empirical decision-based tools.
At the session, Dr Sebastiaan Hetterscheid, Wageningen University, Netherlands, said, “The world is changing, and so are the supply chains.”
He elaborated on the three principles for a sustainable fresh supply chain, which should be based on demand-driven models, quality-driven mechanisms and should be monitored with a holistic approach.
It was concluded in this session that various measures have been taken to enhance cotton farming, which has increased the yield by nine per cent, thereby making India the producer of 25 per cent better cotton.
As a part of Day 2, a special session on Indo-Australian agribusiness trade was organised, where representatives from academia, corporate and policy from both the countries participated.
The session was inaugurated by Australian ministers Simon Birmingham and Andrew Gee, who gave a virtual address via video message. The participants of this session included Manish, joint secretary, ministry of external affairs, Government of India; Prashant Kumar Swain, joint secretary, ministry of agriculture, Government of India; Rod Hilton, deputy high commissioner of Australia in India; representatives from ICAR, DFAT Australia, TERI SAS, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade and vice-chancellors from agricultural universities.
They discussed significant opportunities and challenges to boost trade between the two countries in terms of research and innovation, capacity-building, knowledge exchange, quantitative and qualitative barriers in agri-trade.
Sapna Narula, TERI SAS, remarked, “In fact, in light of sustainable consumption and production which is one of the sustainable development goals, we need to see voluntary sustainability standards as one of the opportunities to boost the trade and link marginalised farmers from India to consumers in Australia. This, of course, requires investment from both the countries.”
Talking about trade policy, Tamanna Chaturvedi, faculty, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (a body under the aegis of the Ministry of Commerce, Government of India), said, “There is need for the market intelligence cell to accommodate trade flows and consumer behaviour in India and Australia to enhance bilateral trade.”
“We should piggy back each other’s FTA and use it to trade with other countries. The SPS Information System should be strengthened,” she added.
A session on climate change, food and nutritional security was organised parallelly which focussed on climate adaptation tools, technologies and practices in context of ending hunger (SDG 2 and SDG 13) and improved nutritional security.
This was followed by a discussion titled Doubling Farmers’ Incomes: Technologies, Business Models and Sustainable Livelihoods, in which speakers deliberated upon innovative tools and technologies, post-harvest technologies, information and communication technologies among others, in order to improve farmers’ income and sustainable livelihood development.
Speaking at the session, Raka Saxena, principal scientist, NIAP, remarked, “The Government of India is implementing various recommendations related to doubling farmers’ income for enhancing agricultural productivity, ensuring sustainability and improved monetisation of agricultural output. The measures include enhancing soil quality, improved input delivery, implementation of market reforms, along with diversification towards high value crops, including value addition and processing.”
The day concluded with a valedictory session with chief guest Suresh Pal, director, ICAR-National Institute for Agricultural Economics and Policy Research; Narula, and Singh of Western Sydney University.
The two-day workshop received active support from coveted organisations like ICAR; Tata Trusts; Tata Cornell Institute for Agriculture; UN Global Compact; Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, Government of India; RMIT University Australia; Deakin University Australia; HAI; Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, FICCI and CII.
It included keynote speakers/experts from FAO, UNEP, World Bank, Icrisat, ICIMOD and many other national and international universities and corporations.
About 250 participants from various agricultural universities, ministries, NGOs (non-governmental organisations) and corporates participated in this conference.
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