French embassy to hold conference on agroecology

Dar es Salaam. The France embassy in Tanzania  is expected to hold three conferences that will underline the opportunity for Tanzania to scale up agroecology for increased productivity for achieving food sovereignty, security and safety, poverty reduction, and enhancing the green and resilient economy.

The conference is organized in collaboration with Food and Agriculture Organization Tanzania (FAO) and the embassy of Belgium, on the programs implemented on agroecology that will focus on four thematic areas which will be held next Tuesday in Arusha and Friday in Morogoro.

During the three conferences Mr Marc Dufumier, a renowned French agronomist, expert on agroecology  will be the guest of honour in Dar es Salaam, Arusha and Morogoro.

The areas that the conferences will focus are food sovereignty, security and safety, achieving a national, resilient and sustainable production of safe food throughout the seasons through agroecology innovative practices and technologies.

The conference will also look at resilience to climate change and environmental conservation, reduce vulnerabilities to climate variability include crop diversification, maintaining local genetic diversity, animal integration, soil organic management, water conservation and harvesting to make grassroots communities more resilient to climate change and extreme weather patterns, including prolonged drought periods and heavy rainfall, rising sea levels and cyclones.

Livelihood improvement and innovation, improving the livelihoods of grassroots communities and contributing to the innovation agenda and Economic reliability: Strengthening opportunities within the growing market of organic food consumption.

 “It is our belief that outcomes of this conference and other efforts will put the country on the path of transforming food and agricultural systems that embrace the spirit of the 2030 agenda; and a much clearer understanding how agroecology facilitates and contributes to transition to food and agricultural systems that are environmentally sustainable, economically fair, viable and socially acceptable,” French ambassador Mr Frédéric Clavier said during the press conference yesterday.

He said the action of the French embassy in the field of agriculture and biodiversity preservation reflects the ambitions of the French government on the agenda for climate change adaptation and mitigation.

To demonstrate this ambition, France supports a project with a grant of $1,000,000 dubbed “Preservation of biodiversity and support to smallholder farmers towards an agro ecological transition”.  The projects involve 6,000 smallholder farmers, 269 farmers’ groups and 8 farmers’ associations benefitting from the projects based in Mtwara region.