37th Asia Pacific Regional Conference begins in Sri Lanka
The 37th Regional Conference for Asia and the Pacific (APRC) will begin today in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
The conference, organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAOUN), is a biennial high-level ministerial meeting bringing together representatives from across the Asia-Pacific with relevant NGOs and agencies.
The APRC’s agenda aims to increase food affordability for over half the world’s population, 45% of whom can’t afford a healthy meal. They also seek to improve the region’s agricultural to support FAOUN’s sustainability goals. This year’s conference is the first in the post-Covid/post-inflation period, and will focus on ensuring food production includes more energy efficient crops like Qunioa. Regional challenges such as rising sea level, resulting in Pacific Islands’ soil salination, and national concerns, such as India’s current farmers’ dispute, will be discussed as well.
Expect significant discussion on ways to integrate AI into food growing and harvesting methods. Previous conferences yielded significant progress in the way of agri-technological sharing. Though concrete policy will not be decided on, owing to the general lack of international governance over AI, this conference will lay the groundwork for eventual agricultural-AI technology sharing between APRC participants.