A two-day high-level ministerial meeting to validate and endorse the IGAD regional food safety strategy and harvest loss strategy is underway in Addis Ababa.
The meeting has been attended by agricultural ministers of the IGAD member countries including Girma Amente, Ethiopian Minister of Agriculture, FAO representatives and among others.
The highest proportion of the current estimate of the global burden of foodborne diseases is in Africa. According to the WHO, 91 million Africans fall sick each year due to foodborne diseases and 137,000 of them die of the same cause, it was noted.
From economic point of view, foodborne diseases contribute to decreased worker productivity, disability and early death, thus lower incomes. An economic impact study done by the World Bank (WB) in 2019 estimated that, annually, unsafe foods cost low-and middle-income economies (mainly those in Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia) about 110 billion US dollar loss in productivity and in the form of medical expenses alone.
Particularly, Africa and the IGAD region currently suffer from food and nutrition insecurity, it was indicated.
The Post-Harvest Loss (PHL) is also another challenge especially for the IGAD region countries by exacerbating the food and nutrition insecurity, the high-level ministerial meeting stressed.
Therefore, the IGAD member countries have been urged to harmonize food safety related standards, practices and procedures so that the food safety related barriers to regional and continental food trade become addressed.
The objective of today’s workshop is to validate and endorse IGAD Post-Harvest Loss Management Strategy and IGAD Food Safety Strategy.
Source: Ethiopian News Agency