The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), in partnership with the Canadian government, has launched a $14.6 million project aimed at making Caribbean agriculture more resilient to climate change while empowering the region's women and young people.
The four-year project, titled Gender Responsive Climate-Smart Agriculture and Food Systems in the Caribbean, is scheduled to run until December 2028. It represents a major commitment under Canada's feminist international assistance policy, according to Canadian High Commissioner to Barbados Lilian Chatterjee.
"We recognise the disproportionate impact of food and input price inflation, supply chain disruptions, and climate change in the Caribbean, which has exacerbated pre-existing food insecurity," said High Commissioner Chatterjee at the regional launch event on Monday. The project was originally announced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the Canada-CARICOM summit last October.
The Canadian high commissioner highlighted that empowering women and closing gender gaps in agri-food systems is key to delivering on the sustainable development goals, as she described women as "powerful agents of change" who can actively contribute to achieving sustainable and resilient agri-food systems. The project aims to influence the institutional governance of agriculture development programmes at regional and national levels through developing knowledge products such as policy briefs on inclusive, gender-responsive climate-resilient value chains in selected Caribbean countries.
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