In this newsletter, you will discover a recap of our event, Regional Conference on Agroecology: Science and Policy, also our consortium partners’ past activities. Dive in to see how we are advancing and what is on the horizon!
Under the high patronage of the Minister of Environment of Tunisia, the Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS) and the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Montpellier (CIHEAM-IAMM) co-organized the Regional Conference on Agroecology: Science and Policy as part of the Horizon Europe NATAE Project.
Over 150 participants in person and nearly 200 online from more than 15 countries. The conference brought together an impressive delegation of current and former ministers, ambassadors, policymakers, development agencies, farmers’ organizations, civil society actors, researchers, and private sector representatives.
The conference served as a dynamic platform to share insights, strategies, and innovative approaches for accelerating the agroecological transition across North Africa and the Mediterranean, addressing the region’s pressing challenges: land degradation, water scarcity, biodiversity loss, and climate change.
Accelerating the agroecological transition for resilient food systems in North Africa
At the Regional Conference on Agroecology, experts, policymakers, and key stakeholders came together to discuss strategies for advancing sustainable agriculture in North Africa. Watch their testimonials, highlight major challenges and emphasise the critical role of policy frameworks, education, and funding in driving the region’s agroecological transition.
Materialization of what the European Union calls for multi-actor approach concretization, because we had Ministers, former Ministers, people from public administration, research institutes, many representatives of civil society, students, and many farmers
A very good forum bringing together all the experts in diferent fields public officials, civil society, private sector students, researchers. Agroecology is a very relevant matter in today’s world as the whole world is focusing on climate change.
Important conference, it is how to draw important lessons to promote our policies, our strategies and our action plans in terms of agroecology and to ensure that our green corridor programme is consistent with the best practices at the national and international level.
At the end of the first 2 days of this workshop, it is very clear that the world in general and in particular we the African countries of the North that have arid areas, we have every interest in developing, in making the agroecological transition because the survival of our lands depends on it.
If a geopolitical event disrupted imports, the situation would be even more critical. Agroecology is really the solution in the long term for a smooth transition, and in the short term if the environment suddenly becomes much more difficult.
With our Tunisian colleagues, we will try to work together to propose a sufficiently rich program meeting all the criteria and parameters of agroecology. We hope to return to Algeria after this meeting to revive agroecological farming, especially for large crops, focusing more on soil conservation agriculture, with God’s help.
RIAM (the Network of Agroecological Initiatives in Morocco) is hosting a webinar on the Systéme Participatif de Garantie (SPG) under the NATAE project, funded by the European Union and led by CIHEAM IAMM. This initiative aims to connect agroecology and ecological transition stakeholders in Morocco.
From January 25th to 28th, 20 farmers, researchers, and development actors from Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, France, and the Netherlands met in Tunisia for the first cross-visit organized as part of the NATAE project. The participants included laboratory representatives from Laghouat, Tizi Ouzou and Setif (Algeria), and Boulmane (Morocco), as well as researchers from WUR and IAMM.
The National Agronomic Institute of Tunisia (INAT) invites agronomy, rural economics, and sociology students to a hands-on field school in Kebili, Tunisia, as part of the NATAE project. Open to final-year engineering and Master’s students from NATAE member countries, this is a unique opportunity to engage with agroecology and industry experts. (https://www.iamm.ciheam.org/fr/project/natae/).
The Living Lab of El Krib in the Siliana district, Tunisia, marked the start of the 2024-25 cropping season with a Field Kick-Off Day on October 24, 2024 under the NATAE project. Supported by the CGIAR Research Initiative on Agroecology and hosted by ICARDA in collaboration with INGC, INAT, and local stakeholders, the event brought together 54 participants, including farmers, researchers, extension agents, and NGOs with a remarkable 50% female participation.
Following-up on the webinar ‘Agroecology Living Labs in Africa’, during which the four projects under the Horizon Europe Farm to Fork program PrAEctiCE, CANALLS, CIRAWA and NATAE shared their perspectives on the development of Living Labs throughout Africa, an offline workshop was co-organized during the Open Living Lab Days 2024 in Timișoara, Romania. The 1.5 h event brought together in a roundtable discussion participants who were either involved in a Living Lab…
MEDAE will implement a webinar that will present the results of a cross-sectional analysis of public policies in North Africa, as well as an examination of the place of agroecology in international conventions, and will look at the extent to which these policies provide a favourable or unfavourable framework for the agroecological transition.
