The international conference of CUTS International’s project ‘Promoting Agriculture-Climate-Trade Linkages in the East African Community (PACT-EAC)’ will be held in Geneva, Switzerland on June 19-20, 2014, in Room S8 of the Maison de la Paix. It will bring into the global discussions lessons learnt from East Africa on the policy linkages between climate change, food security and trade.
The international conference of CUTS International’s project ‘Promoting Agriculture-Climate-Trade Linkages in the East African Community (PACT-EAC)’ will be held in Geneva, Switzerland on June 19-20, 2014, in Room S8 of the Maison de la Paix. It will bring into the global discussions lessons learnt from East Africa on the policy linkages between climate change, food security and trade.
Nowadays, food security is one of the main challenges in East Africa where food production is challenged by extreme weather conditions brought by climate change. To address this challenge, the importance of policy linkages and coherence is regularly recognized by different governments and organizations. Taking into consideration policy linkages contributes not only to inclusive policy-making, but also to the creation of positive spillovers to balance divergent policy objectives and to enhance the capacity of policy makers.
The conference will be attended by Ministers and representatives of different ministries from the five EAC countries (Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda), the EAC Secretariat, NGOs, farmers’ organizations, th private sector, as well as Geneva missions and international organisations like WTO, FAO, UNEP, UNFCCC. The participants’ deliberations over two days will help both the EAC and the global community to consolidate their efforts for addressing inter alia climate-induced food security through trade.
The PACT EAC project is being implemented for the past 3 years with funding support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida). It aims to to increase and communicate the knowledge on climate change-food security-trade linkages, and to enhance the capacity of policy makers and other stakeholders from the region to design holistic policies to better deal with climate change and food security challenges.
CUTS International, Geneva is a non-profit NGO that catalyses the pro-trade, pro-equity voices of the Global South in international trade and development debates in Geneva. We have made a name for linking people and issues in the world of multilateral trade with their counterparts in related policy areas. These include regional integration, agriculture, environment, competition, investment and consumer protection among others.