Damascus-SANA
The Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform, Eng. Muhammad Hassan Qatna, discussed today with the Lebanese Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Abbas Hajj Hassan, mechanisms for marketing agricultural products to the markets of the two countries, exchanging experiences and enhancing cooperation in accordance with the agreements signed between them.
During a meeting held today at the Ministry of Agriculture building in Damascus, the two sides focused on the importance of supporting the integration process between Arab countries to achieve Arab food security and the possibility of exchanging experiences and information that would enable the development of agricultural production between the two countries, exchanging the results of successful projects and creating cross-border projects between them.
In a statement to reporters after the meeting, Minister Qatna stressed the need to work on facilitating the exchange of agricultural products and production requirements between the two countries and to develop solutions to the problems facing the marketing and exchange processes, stressing the ministry's readiness to cooperate with the Lebanese side on the issue of allocating forest plants and facilitating the marketing of some products, including bananas, pointing to the need for cooperation also to confront Climate change and achieving integration by working with Arab and international organizations such as (ACSAD) and (FAO) to put in place joint development projects for both countries.
In turn, the Lebanese Minister of Agriculture explained that the import and export process was discussed, especially with regard to citrus, bananas and vegetables, which would benefit the farmers of the two countries, noting that mechanisms for reducing transit fees and areas of cooperation in research on forestry operations and fruitful and non-fruitful trees were also discussed.
Director of the Arab Center for Studies of Dry Areas and Dry Lands (ACSAD), Dr. Nasr El-Din El-Obeid indicated that the center is working to achieve integration and coordination between Arab ministries of agriculture to benefit from the advantages of each ministry and to work together to make up for the food security gap that has been increased by climate changes and the Corona pandemic, pointing out that Syria offers All the support, expertise and infrastructure for the center to achieve its main objective, which is to advance the agricultural sector and achieve Arab food security.
Mehran Mualla
