Courtesy translation
Dear Director Qu,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Welcome to the Quirinale.
I am very happy to have this meeting.
The celebrations of the upcoming World Food Day represent a fruitful opportunity to tangibly reinforce the global community’s efforts to combat hunger and malnutrition.
I find this year’s theme “Right to Foods for a Better Life and a Better Future” to be particularly appropriate.
No future is possible without food security.
Unfortunately, we know that statistics show a woeful increase in the number of people suffering from hunger throughout the world.
It is a phenomenon compounded by the proliferation of wars and their dramatic impact on civil populations.
Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine is still ongoing, hovered by new shadows cast by the repeated threat of the use of nuclear devices.
The fiery situation in Gaza is currently extending to Lebanon, thus opening a new “humanitarian front”.
In Sudan, the personal power struggles between the leaders of the warring factions have brought the scourge of starvation back to the Country.
Man-made conflicts are compounded with the phenomena of climate change which increasingly affect all Countries, conditioning all our lives.
At the same time, we are witnessing a paradox: while millions of people starve, other millions suffer from obesity and overeating.
While in some regions there is a shocking food shortage, other regions record absurdly widespread food waste.
In this scenario of injustice and dangerous disequilibria that give rise to contrasts and frictions, which are sometimes weaponized by those who deliberately pursue divisions within the international community, it is growingly urgent to equip the frailer communities with new tools ensuring them the sustainable development of agricultural, food and environmental systems.
Everywhere in the world, water and land represent the essential common goods that require increasing protection and to be forcefully reintegrated into the general interests of communities.
The imperative must be to “produce better and consume less”. Unarguably, innovation, research and new technologies can now help human beings to achieve this fundamental goal.
This is the difficult but priceless task that FAO has been performing for decades.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Your personal and professional presence importantly and significantly enriches our Country.
The decision to make Rome the international seat of UN food and agriculture agencies can be traced back to the foresight of Italian ruling parties at the beginning of the past century.
Indeed, the Rome Conference of May 1905 laid the grounds for the establishment of the International Institute of Agriculture by Italy along with forty more Countries.
This represented the launch of the first intergovernmental organization called to address agricultural issues at global level and which later interlaced with the destiny of FAO in 1951, when its seat was moved to Italy from the United States.
That was the sign of a new international awareness of the need to tackle the real problems of peoples, based on the pursuit of peace and of a world in which solidarity and cooperation would prevail over conflict.
It is an example of the multilateralism upon which the Italian Republic has hinged its actions.
Italy is honoured to host in Rome the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organizations through the presence of FAO, the WFP, and IFAD and I am happy that the opening of the World Food Forum next week might be concomitant with the start of the celebrations for the 80th anniversary of FAO which, as you recalled, is due in October 2025.
This year, Italy’s cooperation with FAO, which recently collaborated in important initiatives such as the Summit meetings on food systems, has also extended to more complex contexts starting with the “Food for Gaza” initiative aimed at providing food assistance for the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip who suffer from a dramatic humanitarian crisis.
The celebrations for the 80th anniversary of FAO launches a renewed global commitment to achieve Goal 2 of the United Nations 2030 Agenda, which is synthesized by the yet unachieved “zero hunger” formula.
This is another reason that makes the initiative for the Food and Agriculture Museum and Network so important.
Please accept my thanks for this marvelous logo, Mr. Director General. And thank you for the invitation. I will be delighted to accept it.
Italy will unwaveringly continue to support the FAO’s mandate.
Allow me to extend my thanks to all of you who, with professionalism and commitment, every day devote your time to achieving the fundamental goals of eradicating hunger in the world and, more in general, of satisfying humanity’s primary need of food.
Thank you for all you do, and I wish you all the utmost success in your work.
