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ADDIS ABABA. – The African Union (AU) yesterday urged African countries to embrace new technologies to reverse the current food insecurity and malnutrition prevalence in Africa.

The appeal was made by AU Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture Josefa Sacko as part of the commemoration of the 10th Africa Day for Food and Nutrition Security (ADFNS), which was held under the theme “Fostering New Agricultural Technologies for Improved African Diets”.

The AU official mainly emphasised that “advancements in agricultural, food and nutrition technologies should provide an opportunity for reversing the current trends in food insecurity and malnutrition prevalence”.

“Agricultural technologies are the means to sustaining food and nutrition security,” Sacko said. Sacko further encouraged the 55 AU member countries “to start promoting the utilisation of emerging knowledge to benefit the development of our food systems and food value chains”.

She also called upon “all stakeholders to work together to come up with an All Africa Food and Nutrition Expo in one of the AU member states and to mobilise its public and private sectors to support the preparations, organization and participation in the    event.”

The AU, noting that hunger and malnutrition has risen in Africa instead of reducing, also emphasised the need to find ways and modalities to advance new agricultural technologies to tackle hunger and malnutrition from the African continent. – Xinhua