Call to Civil Society Organisations to participate in the civil society consultation to the FAO at the regional FAO conference of Europe and Central Asia in Baku (Azerbaijan)
March 2012
Dear Civil Society organisations,
Following the Civil society meeting of December 2011 in Budapest, this letter serves to take forward the preparation process for the upcoming civil society consultation that will take place from the 15th until the 16th of April 2012 in Baku, Azerbaijan.
The topics on the agenda of the civil society meeting would be the following:
Sunday afternoon - Global, Regional, National Governance on Food and Agriculture
First draft of the Global Strategic Framework , Adopted FAO Voluntary Guidelines on responsible use of Land tenure, Forestry, and Fisheries,..Presentation of Civil Society Mechanism, its role and functioning
Preparations to multi-stakeholder discussion on Committee on World Food Security (CFS) related matters.
Monday morning: - Access to land and commons
Evaluation of current land policies, Differences and commonalities across the region, Youth and women access to land and other resources
Linked to ECA agenda items (4) Land reform and farm performance in Europe; and (5) Women in Agriculture - Closing the Gender Gap for Development in Europe.
Monday afternoon - Policies on Food and Agriculture
Ensuring Policy coordination and coherence to promoteFood Sovereignty, Solidarity economy, Support to sustainable agriculture, Development of sustainable value chain, Best practices to connect producers with consumers
Civil Society will also host a multistakeholder meeting on Governance of food and agriculture on the 17th of April in the morning and present a civil society declaration at the European Regional Conference. On the 17th in the afternoon a local study tour will be organised as well.
Furthermore we mentioned the need to link the regional consultation to the Civil Society Mechanism of the CFS and to regional dynamics such as Nyeleni Europe.
Please find in attachment the provisional agendas in English of European Commission of Agriculture (17th and 18th of April) and the European Regional Conference (19th and 20th of April).It is not clear yet, how many observers or participants from civil society will be able to attend these meetings.
For the FAO-funded participants, a quota system was developed in order to assure balanced participation of different groups, regions and sectors.
As a general criteria, participants are representatives of the different constituencies' organisations. At least half of the representatives should be women and one third should be youth (maximum 35 years old).
A third of the participants should come from Western Europe, another third from Eastern and Central Europe and another third from Central Asia.
Within those regional representations, different constituencies are identified. 3/10 should be producers of which at least one third small-scale sustainable producers and another third from artesanal fisherfolk, pastoralist, indigenous or landless organisations. 2/10 should come from agricultural and food workers' organisations, 2/10 should come from consumer organisations (of which half from urban poor organisations, 1/10 should come from NGOs, 1/10 from youth organisations and 1/10 from women organisations.
We hope we will be able to identify representative candidates who can take an pro-active role in the discussions and some also in the preparations of the consultation. Please circulate this invitation in your networks or to other possible relevant organisations.
If your organisation would like to send a representative, please send, the attached candidate form by the 15th of March 2012 to Annelies Schorpion ().
The overall participation budget is limited, and would not be enough to cover the participation costs of all candidates.
We would like to inform you that the organiser is not able to provide accident, medical or any other type of insurance for participants. The organiser can assume no responsibility in the event of illness or accident.
Please take into account possible long visa procedures. We will assist with visa but, please, check the visa requirements with the Embassy of Azerbaijan in your country.
Best regards,
Stineke Oenema, for the Civil Society Mechanism of the Committee on World Food Security.
Geneviève Savigny, European Coordination Via Campesina for the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC).