Mr. Chairperson
Excellencies
Distinguished Governors
Ladies and Gentleman

It is indeed my great pleasure to be here to address this august assembly on behalf of the Government of Nepal and my own behalf in this historic city, Rome.

Mr. Chairperson,

In these very crucial times, we are gathered here, for the first time in human history, when the number of people suffering from hunger and malnutrition has exceeded one billion. And the situation is more critical and alarming for developing countries particularly African and South Asian Countries.

I think this is a good initiative and provides a common platform for all country delegates to share their countries experiences, knowledge, innovative ideas and development issues and challenges in agriculture and the food sector. The developing countries are more vulnerable and food insecure, because of emerging challenges and depletion of natural resources particularly land, water and forests. Majority of the farmers in developing countries are smallholders, resource poor and have limited access to these resources.

For sustainable economic growth , we need balance between the basic needs of all people and capacity of the earth’s natural resources. The rate of agricultural production is much lower than the population growth particularly in LDCs and this makes the situation more vulnerable and challenging.

Mr. Chairperson,

The current global situation of agriculture is the consequence of low investment, neglected agriculture and rural development from the development agenda by the international community and development partners. Therefore, there is an urgent need for collaborative efforts to increase investment substantially on addressing the emerging challenges like food insecurity, climate change, linking smallholders to high value export markets and enhancing competitiveness and building resilience of smallholder farmers.

The Government of Nepal has initiated some of the policy reforms like developing 20 years long term vision (Agriculture Development Strategy) and formulating a Food and Nutrition Security plan of Action to overcome these challenges.

I am very much confident that this event will be meaningful on deriving lasting solutions and pave an avenue for the upcoming Ri+20 conference, and formulation of  a smallholder-farmers friendly, green economy  to overcome  the current challenges in agriculture and the rural development sector.

I once again thank you all.

22 February 2012