Pacific Week of Agriculture

Vanuatu is hosting the one-week event from today to 20 October in partnership with the Pacific Community (SPC) and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The intensive week of meetings will see international and regional participants explore innovations, discuss challenges and look for ways to protect and expand agriculture in the Pacific.

With support from the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), over 30 participants from the Caribbean, Africa and other Pacific Island countries are expected to take part in the event.

The week-long event is aimed at becoming Pacific's premiere agriculture event on the Pacific calendar and bringing together people from different agriculture sectors to discuss the future of agriculture.

PWA Media and Communications Team Leader, Kiery Manassah said the event will attract more than 2000 people from across the region and internationally.

“All 26 members of Pacific Community (SPC) which includes four metropolitans- Australia, New Zealand, France and US will be at the meeting and represented by the respective Agriculture Ministers and Officials,” he said.

Plans are well underway for the event scheduled for October 16th to the 20th.

However, the head of communications for the organisers, Kiery Manassah, told RNZ gaining the attention of people in Vanuatu for the event has been tricky with other activities coming up in the country.

Manassah said people are talking more about the Pacific Mini Games, which is coming up in December.

Speaking prior to the launch yesterday, Mr Seremiah congratulated the organising committee and its team for coming up with an exciting theme for PWA, such as Pacific CROPS which stands for Culture, Resilience, Opportunities, Products and Sustainability.

The government has appointed former Director General of Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Forests, Fisheries and Biosecurity, Howard Aru to spearhead the planning of the week-long event.

The Pacific Week of Agriculture will be held in the week of October 16, 2017.

It will precede the SPC Heads of Agriculture and Forestry Meeting and the joint FAO and SPC Pacific Agriculture Ministers Meeting.

The theme of the inaugural event is Pacific ‘CROPS’ (Culture, Resilient, Opportunity, Product and Sustainability).

Neil Netaf, senior advisor to the Ministry of Agriculture in Vanuatu, praised what he described as a political will within CARICOM after observing “frank” discussions among CARICOM ministers during their closed-door meeting of the Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED) on Friday.

COTED promotes trade and economic development of CARICOM and oversees the operations of the Single Market and Economy. Friday’s meeting formed part of the one-week annual Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA), which took place in Grand Cayman from October 24 – 28.