IFAD to open Islamabad office to strengthen food security

ISLAMABAD: The opening of an International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) office in Islamabad next month will boost partnership between the two sides, Pakistani state media reported on Saturday, citing officials.

The Pakistani government last year signed an agreement with the IFAD for the opening of its country office in Pakistan, which would formalize already existing cooperation between the two sides in food security, climate resilience and rural poverty reduction.

The IFAD is a specialized agency of the United Nations that works to address poverty and hunger in rural areas of developing countries. It has the biggest portfolio in Pakistan, with both sides having executed 28 projects for $2.91 billion of investments.

To review cooperation and discuss opening of IFAD Islamabad office, Pakistan’s Abmassador Ali Javed held a bilateral meeting with IFAD President Alvaro Lario at the IFAD headquarters in Rome.

“Both sides welcomed their longstanding history of excellent cooperation since 1979, and expressed satisfaction over the status of ongoing projects,” the Pakistani state-run APP news agency reported.

“In conclusion, both sides resolved to consolidate bilateral cooperation and acknowledged institutionalized cooperation through upcoming IFAD Country Office Islamabad to serve as new chapter in their partnership.”

IFAD Pakistan Country Director Fernanda Thomaz Da Rocha, who was also present on the occasion, expressed her keenness to work with her counterparts in taking forward the bilateral cooperation to a new dimension, according to the report.

She will formally operationalize IFAD country office Islamabad next month.

Faced with an economic crisis and adverse impacts of climate change, Pakistan has been making efforts to boost the national food security. Agriculture contributes 23 percent to Pakistan’s GDP and employs 37.4 percent of the labor force, but the country’s productivity is currently below par, with decreasing cultivation area, a population-production gap, and agricultural imports amounting to $10 billion.

In July last year, Pakistan established a Land Information and Management System, Center of Excellence (LIMS-CoE) to enhance modern agro-farming by utilizing over 9 million hectares of uncultivated state land, with a senior official saying that Saudi Arabia provided an initial $500 million investment to set up the facility.

It was one of the initiatives under the umbrella of the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) as part of which the federal and provincial governments had decided to introduce the initiative of corporate agriculture farming (CAF) in all provinces.

Later in the same month, Pakistan Army Chief General Asim Munir, who is a member of the SIFC, and the then prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, inaugurated the nation’s first corporate farm as part of the initiative to modernize agricultural practices in the South Asian country.