The Director of Follow-up to the Summit of the Americas Process, Bernardo Badani, informed the Executive Committee of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) of the preparations for the most important hemispheric meeting of 2009 related to agriculture and rural life.

Scheduled to take place in Jamaica in October next year, the meeting will bring the ministers of agriculture of the Americas together for their Fifth Ministerial Meeting. As the Secretariat of the Ministerial Process, IICA had been working on the preparations with the Ministry of Agriculture and Lands of Jamaica, the official said.

“The 2009 Ministerial Process is the result of the decision you took in Guatemala last year. We are supporting the implementation of the Guatemala 2007 Agreement and preparing the updated version of the AGRO Plan for the 2010-2011 biennium,” Badani told the 17 delegations that attended the meeting of IICA’s Executive Committee, held 22-24 July at the Institute’s Headquarters.

The highest-level political forum in the hemisphere, the Ministerial Meeting establishes the priorities and strategic actions for the sustainable development of agriculture and the rural milieu, which are then referred to the Heads of State and Government of the Americas for approval.

Next year the leaders of the hemisphere will also be meeting, at the Fifth Summit of the Americas. Unlike previous summits, however, it will precede the meeting of ministers and take place in Trinidad and Tobago.

“We want agriculture and rural life to continue to form an active part of the summit process and the decisions of the ministers of agriculture of the Americas to be reflected in the meeting of presidents in April,” said IICA Director General Chelston Brathwaite.

Therefore, he went on, it is “important that the ministers, ministerial delegates and other representatives of the countries play an active part in the process and in generating input so that the proposal submitted to the Summit of the Americas reflects the will of the countries.”

First steps on the road to Trinidad and Tobago

Badani announced that within a few days the Government of Trinidad and Tobago would be presenting to the OAS Permanent Council the draft version of Declaration of Port of Spain, which the Heads of State and Government would be signing at the Summit.

The Summit Implementation Review Group (SIRG) will be discussing the declaration first. The document is entitled “Ensuring our citizens’ future through the promotion of human prosperity, energy security and environmental sustainability.”

As an institutional partner in the summit process, IICA has been participating in all the meetings of the Joint Summit Working Group (JSWG) and the SIRG. Through the summit process, which began in 1994, the leaders of the Americas have issued mandates and assumed commitments that provide the hemispheric political context of the Ministerial Process.

IICA Deputy Director Christopher Hansen said, “We are very pleased with the progress that has been made. At their last three summits the leaders have endorsed the process of improving agriculture and rural life.”

Inter-American Board of Agriculture

In 2009, Jamaica will also be hosting another high-level hemispheric event: the Fifteenth Regular Meeting of the Inter-American Board of Agriculture (IABA).

Comprised of IICA’s 34 member countries, the IABA is the Institute’s highest-level governing body. At next year’s meeting, it will be electing a new Director General of the Institute.