Minister of Agriculture Syahrul Yasin Limpo signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to strengthen South-South and Triangular Cooperation (KSST) in agriculture and food security with the Director General of FAO (The Food and Agriculture Organization) QuDongyu on the sidelines of a series of meetings of the Minister of Agriculture G-20 countries. "As an agricultural country and one of the largest exporters of agricultural products, Indonesia continues to strive to increase its various roles at the global level.
Indonesia's active role in the international arena is needed as a means of diplomacy that in parallel supports efforts to improve the domestic agricultural sector," he said as quoted by the official statement. , Sunday (19/9). According to the Minister of Agriculture, the strengthening of SSTC is used as one of the strategies in increasing international development cooperation as stated in the 2020-2024 RPJMN. "Moreover, Indonesia is part of the G20. Through this scheme, it is hoped that it will be able to create mutual benefits and contribute positively in supporting the common goal of G20 countries to create prosperity globally," said the Minister of Agriculture. The Minister of Agriculture said that the agreement was a form of Indonesia's commitment from the agricultural sector to participate in building global food security as an innovative leader and share best practices with other stakeholders.
"We are ready to position ourselves as an innovative leader to be able to share best practices with multi-stakeholders, especially in less developed partner countries," he said. According to the Minister of Agriculture, the MoU signed between the Ministry of Agriculture and FAO covers various aspects that are expected to be able to comprehensively resolve existing global problems in agriculture and food security as well as to achieve sustainable development goals. Read also: Ministry of Agriculture Wins Two Highest Awards at the 2021 Indonesian Public Relations Award Indonesia through the Ministry of Agriculture in the implementation of this cooperation will later play a role in the form of technical support; institutional capacity development; transfer of knowledge, experience and innovative technology; exchange of learning (technical experts, farmers, policy makers); as well as information/knowledge/experience sharing and collaboration platforms. The Ministry of Agriculture itself has previously implemented and played a role in more than 100 collaborative projects whose benefits were felt by more than 50 countries in Asia, Africa and the Pacific, as well as in Palestine. Several centers at the Ministry of Agriculture have become Centers of Excellence in the implementation of SSTC, including BBIB Singosari (artificial insemination) and Agricultural Training Centers (Lembang, Batu, Ketindan).
The Ministry of Agriculture is a pioneer in the construction of the Farmer's Agricultural and Rural Training Center (FARTC) in Tanzania and the Agricultural Rural Farmers Training Center (ARFTC) in The Gambia. The Minister of Agriculture hopes that the agreement will further strengthen Indonesia's leadership role in the SSTC framework in the agricultural sector and increase Indonesia's contribution to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 2030). Indonesia's position as a "neutral player" is an added value in establishing cooperation with various other southern countries. Increasing Indonesia's active role in SSTC is very important to provide benefits in development both from an economic, social and political perspective. The configuration of the SSTC scheme itself consists of several parts, namely southern countries (another name for developing countries) receiving aid, southern countries providing aid (donors), as well as developed countries and multilateral institutions as donors and supporters. Since the 1980s, Indonesia has started to turn into a donor country and continues to be committed to strengthening SSTC.
