Advocate of Resilient Agriculture to Feed Caribbean to Receive IICA Award
(Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture) Ramgopaul Roop, a prominent farmer and advocate for resilient agriculture in the Caribbean, with a focus on efficient water use and soil health, will receive the “Soul of Rurality” award bestowed by the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) on Leaders of Rurality in the Americas.
The award is an initiative of the specialist agency in agricultural and rural development to recognise men and women who are leaving their mark and making a difference in rural Latin America and the Caribbean.
In addition to receiving the “Soul of Rurality” award, IICA’s Leaders of Rurality awardees will be invited to participate in various advisory bodies of the organisation.
IICA Director General, Manuel Otero, remarked that, “The award pays tribute to those who are playing a unique dual role: guaranteeing food and nutritional security, by producing under all circumstances, as well as protecting the biodiversity of the planet. It will also emphasise their capacity to be positive role models in rural areas of the region”.
Under the initiative, IICA will strive to ensure that the recognition facilitates the establishment of linkages with state, civil society and private sector organisations to gain support for the awardees’ causes.
In launching the initiative, the Director General, reflected that, “These are people whose influence can be seen in all the food that we eat—wherever it ends up—and in each plot of agricultural land and in the communities where farmers and their families live. These men and women are leaving their mark and are the soul of rurality, because they produce, plant, harvest, create, innovate and unite”.
Read more at: Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture
Source: CARICOM TODAY