This year, the on-site 43rd Meeting of the ASEAN Food Security Reserve Board (AFSRB) was successfully held on 7-8 June 2023 at Bogor, West Java, Indonesia. The meeting was co-organised by the AFSRB Secretariat and hosted by the National Food Agency (NFA) of the Republic of Indonesia, as the national focal point. This is the first in-person meeting since the COVID-19 pandemic. The meeting was participated by ASEAN country members and related organisation, for instance, ASEAN Secretariat (ASEC), ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR) Secretariat, ASEAN Food Security Information System (AFSIS) Secretariat, and the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East ASIA (ERIA).
The APTERR Secretariat team led by Dr. Choomjet Karnjanakesorn, General Manager, together with Mr. Prakorn Lorsiriwong, Administrative Staff, enthusiastically attended the meeting in order to report and give presentation of the progress on ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR) activities during Fiscal Year (FY)2022-present. Dr. Karnjanakesorn informed the meeting about the recent successful implementations of Tier 3 programme while also highlighted the meeting on the importance of Tier 1 and 2 programme of the APTERR mechanisms to the food security in the region. In addition, the meeting noted the content of the reports provided by a decision-support tool named Food Emergency Monitoring and Information (FEMI) which is designed to assess and monitor the food security situation in the APTERR member countries. Dr. Karnjanakrsorn also provided the meeting the list of the organisations and meetings visited and attended by the APTERR Secretariat as the process to gain more public recognition. In this regard, the meeting was informed that the Leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) recognized the essential role of the APTERR in preparing for future food security crises as stated in the Hiroshima Action Statement for Resilient Global Food Security issued at G7 Summit held on 19-21 May 2023 in Hiroshima, Japan.
Apart from the report on the progress of each organisations and the situation on rice and other commodities from each member countries, the other key content of the meeting was the discussion on the ASEAN Leader’s Declaration on Strengthening Food Security and Nutrition in Times of Crises, in which, the APTERR was mentioned as one of the existing mechanism of food security and nutrition in response to crises and shall be strengthened to achieve more effectiveness and quick release of emergency rice reserves.
The meeting invited the guest speaker, Dr. Isabelle Antunès, to make presentation on “Rethinking ASEAN food security by looking at culinary and biodiversity heritage as a driving development force”.
Furthermore, the NFA of Indonesia hosted a field trip to the Bogor Botanical Garden for the participants on 8 June 2023 to represent the plant diversity. The Bogor Botanical Garden not only acts as a place for cultivation of tropical plants but also a research center for agriculture and horticulture as it is the oldest botanical garden in Southeast Asia.
.
Throughout the meeting, Dr. Karnjanakesorn kept discussing and exchanging views and ideas to other participants in order to strengthen food security in the region and achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
