UAE to circulate COP28 draft declaration on food security

livemint.com:

DUBAI : The United Arab Emirates (UAE), the host of the UN climate change conference (COP28) this year, will circulate a draft landmark declaration for food security transition to member countries in a few days, UAE’s climate change and environment minister Mariam Al Mehairi said in an interview. COP28, under the UAE presidency, aims to transform food systems to ensure that it is part of national climate efforts and secure the annual $100 billion in climate finance owed to developing nations. She also highlighted the challenges in importing fertilizers and wheat from Russia because of the war and the COP28 presidency’s focus on improving lives and livelihoods in Africa, helping unlock Africa’s green energy potential and ensuring food security.

Edited excerpts: Food security has been a key focus area at G20. Can you tell us about the policy proposals related to food security at COP28? COP28’s food agenda is developed to be kind of a northern star for countries who are serious about food system transformation. It is made of four pillars.

The first pillar is political will, which we are calling the Emirates Declaration, and in a few days, I am going to send it to all agriculture ministers across all member countries to sign off on the declaration because it is important when you want to transform something, you need to have the political will. What this means is to make sure that the food system is part of the nationally determined contributions (NDCs), national adaptation plans (NAPs), and national biodiversity strategy. The second pillar is non-stake actors.