The Director General of IICA, Manuel Otero. Efeagro

This was stated this Monday the Director General of IICA, Manuel Otero, at the meeting of the Directing Council of Fontagro, a mechanism created in 1998 to “promote innovation in family farming, competitiveness and food security”.

Otero has valued the work with the countries to reposition science and technology issues, "facilitating access to the new frontier of knowledge that allows the journey of a path to full agricultural and rural development with the internalization of the dimensions of environmental sustainability and social inclusion ”.

He pointed out that IICA's main concern is "to ensure the institutional conditions so that the region can take advantage of the transformation potential offered by the new science and technology scenarios."

In this sense, he has recalled “The express ministerial mandate for IICA to act as an innovation platform for agriculture continental".

The general director of the entity has highlighted "the importance of institutional innovation" to meet the demand for new approaches after "the successful models that dominated the region during the last decades", and that "promoted transformations" and placed the Americas "in a central place for global food security".

He also highlighted IICA's work in areas such as biotechnology and digital agriculture "that require differentiated strategies", and in which the Institute is establishing "a mechanism to facilitate access to these technologies for countries with fewer resources. ”.

As examples, Otero cited, in a statement, IICA's alliance with the organization PAD –founded by the Nobel Prize winner Michael Kremer-, whose objective is to bring assistance via cell phone to family producers, as well as interaction with the Inter-American Development Bank (BID) and Microsoft for a pro-connectivity agenda.

For Otero it is also relevant the bioeconomy as "a promising path", since it offers the possibility of expanding the scope of agriculture and rurality.

He also explained that in the face of the challenges facing agriculture in the hemisphere, increased by the effects of the pandemic caused by covid-19, “greater alliances and institutional contributions are required, thus forming the platform that American agriculture needs for its back".

“We are in a time of accelerated changes that demand consistent responses. In that sense, our main concern is ensure the institutional conditions for Latin America and the Caribbean to take full advantage of the transformation potential offered by the new science and technology scenarios ", has added.

Fontagro, sponsored by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and IICA, is made up of 15 countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Spain, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Uruguay and Venezuela), as recalled by IICA.

The Board of Directors meeting was attended by, among others, the president of the Brazilian Agricultural Research Company (Embrapa), Celso Moretti; the FAO Regional Representative for Latin America and the Caribbean, Julio Berdegué; and the director for the Americas of the Bioversity International-CIAT Alliance, Jesús Quintana.