The Covid-19 pandemic generated a sharp increase in digital trade and has yielded numerous valuable experiences to systematize and design new development strategies for rural dwellers in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The participants included Saboto Caesar, Minister of Agriculture of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; Krysta Harden, Executive Director and President of the U.S. Dairy Export Council; Manuel Bravo, President and Executive Director of Bayer Mexico; Michael Kremer, University of Chicago professor and winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics; and Manuel Otero, Director General of IICA.

The entities will collaborate under a technical cooperation agreement, aimed at developing a more sustainable agriculture sector and providing training for small farmers and MSMEs.

Clarence Rambharat, Trinidad and Tobago’s Minister of Agriculture, Land and Fisheries, was interviewed from Port of Spain on the Agro América program, which airs on the Brazilian TV station, Agro Mais.

The entities signed an agreement to encourage the inclusion of youth in the design of policies and initiatives in areas such as resilience, traceability, biotechnology, sanitary and phytosanitary matters and food security.

Caribbean ministers of agriculture stressed the need to reduce food import dependency and to digitalize rural areas, while offering proposals to increase climate change resilience.