Argentina to host the next meeting of the Inter-American Board of Agriculture

*IICA’s Director General presented details of concrete results that had been achieved, such as the* *implementation of the General Directorate’s Competitive Fund.*

San José, Costa Rica, October 21, 2011 (IICA). Argentina will be the site of the next meeting of the Inter-American Board of Agriculture (IABA), scheduled to take place in 2013. The decision was taken by the delegates of the member countries of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), who today concluded their sixteenth regular meeting.

During the meeting, the IABA approved the Institute’s budget for 2012 and 2013, and thanked Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay and Uruguay for increasing the quotas they contribute to this inter-American agency to finance its operations.

IICA’s highest-level governing body—which met in San Jose, Costa Rica—received a report from the Institute’s Director General, Víctor M. Villalobos, on the actions that have been implemented during his administration.

“Two years ago you did me the great honor of electing me to lead IICA, to ensure that the institution continued to play a leading role in agricultural development in the hemisphere,” Villalobos said.

He added that this was a key moment for agriculture in the hemisphere. “One of the most important measures instituted by the countries to tackle the crisis was a reassessment of the importance of their agricultural sectors, and food security became a priority objective of public policies.”

IICA’s Director General presented details of concrete results that had been achieved, such as the implementation of the General Directorate’s Competitive Fund, with an initial budget of nearly US$1 million. Seventeen projects are already under way, in areas such as food security, climate change, agricultural health and food safety, and agribusiness.

Villalobos also mentioned that his administration had obtained 100 scholarships per year to enable citizens of Latin American and Caribbean countries to study in Mexico for master’s degrees and doctorates related to agriculture and rural well-being, a development that was warmly welcomed by the delegates to the meeting in Costa Rica.

Over the last two years, IICA has focused on creating country strategies to orient its activities based on the needs of the ministries of agriculture, and on consolidating strategic partnerships. “No single institution can develop agriculture on its own, we need to work together,” Villalobos stressed.

The IABA thanked the Director-General elect of FAO, José Graziano Da Silva, for pledging to strengthen his organization’s joint activities with IICA and to consolidate specific mechanisms for that purpose.

Two Directors Emeritus of IICA took part in this sixteenth meeting of the IABA: Martín Piñeiro (1986-1994) and Chelston Brathwaite (2002-2010).

For more information, contact:
patricia.leon@iica.int