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Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you also to the three speakers for their excellent presentations. They were very useful for me to understand key elements related to the New Alliance.
Having said that, I would like to say a few words about where Japan stands on this issue. Japan is committed to the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition as a member of the G8. We are aware of the importance of the review and reform by the Ethiopian Government of its prioritized agricultural policy issues as well as private sector investment in agriculture to help increase crop production and distribution in Ethiopia. Yet, Japan’s emphasis has been placed on smallholder farmers, who constitute the majority of the farming population. Japan has helped them increase productivity, expand farmland and improve livelihoods through capacity-building and technical cooperation in such areas as promoting quality seeds, improving agricultural marketing systems, irrigation development and so on. We are so much engaged in funding in this sector except for extending grants to procure fertilizer through the KR2 scheme. We will continue these ODA programs in Ethiopia for the coming years as our contribution.
In addition to these, what else we can do in relation to the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition? This is the challenge we face today. On this point I need clear guidance from Tokyo before I go any further here in this workshop. In the meantime, we are interested in discussing with our partners, both donors and private sector participants, how best we can coordinate our efforts and align our programs with the New Alliance so that maximum synergy effects can be achieved out of our parallel efforts.
From this point of view, we are looking forward to a new framework of coordination to be established under the Rural Economic Development and Food Security Platform. In this regard, I have a request. If your talks are focused only on the implementation of programs, you do not necessarily have to invite the Embassy of Japan. However, if policy issues are discussed under this platform, please send an invitation not only to JICA but also to the Embassy as our agriculture attaché is fully involved in policy matters.
Thank you. |
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