Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

National Dialogue on Nigeria’s Convergence Initiative

Duration: 4:10 412 transcript words EN summary

Video summary

Nigeria has emerged as a significant player in the global fight against climate change and food insecurity, recently becoming the twenty-second nation to join the Convergence Initiative. This pivotal step was taken at a critical time following the release of Nigeria's Nationally Determined Contribution 3.0 Zero, which demonstrates a high level of ambition regarding climate action. The initiative, supported by the UN Food Systems Coordination Hub, aims to transform food systems and accelerate climate efforts to help countries achieve the Sustainable Development Goals and the targets set by the Paris Agreement. By joining this global effort, Nigeria aligns its national strategies with international standards while empowering local efforts to build a more resilient future. The core mandate driving this collaboration is to guarantee national food security and achieve true food sovereignty, ensuring that Nigeria can eat what it produces and produce what it needs. A major challenge identified in this context is resource constraint, which necessitates a strategy that carefully examines all actors within the value chain. The initiative is built on a deliberate interface between science, policy, and society to ensure that interventions are evidence-informed, socially legitimate, economically viable, and locally adaptable. To address these challenges, specific priority actions have been outlined, including championing community seed banks, early warning systems, solar-powered irrigation, and farmer education programs. To further strengthen the framework, four key priority actions were established for the tenth assembly of the initiative. These include approving and protecting budgets for climate-smart agriculture, legislating incentives for private sector investment in renewable energy for agriculture, mandating nutrition-sensitive climate action through biofortified crops, and establishing a joint committee to report annually on food systems and climate issues. The health of the food system is recognized as profoundly affecting human health, the environment, the economy, and culture, making these actions essential for holistic development. By addressing these interconnected areas, the initiative seeks to create a sustainable model that supports both ecological balance and economic stability. Ultimately, the discussions facilitated by the Food Systems Coordination Hub involve a broad range of stakeholders, including government bodies, civil society, the private sector, and Rome-based agencies like FAO, EAD, and WFP. The collective goal is to ensure that Nigeria receives the right support to prioritize its efforts in accelerating climate action and transforming food systems. Through this collaborative approach, the nation aims to meet the ambitious goals identified for 2030, securing a future where food security and environmental sustainability go hand in hand. This comprehensive strategy not only addresses immediate resource constraints but also lays a robust foundation for long-term resilience against climate shocks and food shortages.

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Nigeria stands out as one of the countries that recognizes is uh the importance of tackling together climate action and food systems. Uh this week Nigeria became uh the 22nd country that joined the convergence initiative. It does so uh at an important moment last year. Nigeria uh released its uh nationally determined contribution, its NDC 3.0 zero which already shows a high level of ambition when it comes to climate action. >> Our mandate is to guarantee national food security to achieve food sovereignity where Nigeria is able to eat what it produces and produce what it eats. And so within this context I want to say that the resource constraint is a major issue. So the convergence should as a matter of necessity identify the strategy that we look at the value chain actors. The convergence initiative is a global effort supported by the UN food systems coordination hub. It is designed to bring food systems transformation and climate action agendas empowering national efforts to achieve the SDGs and the Paris climate agreement targets and Nigeria being one of the countries selected to implement this. This initiative is built on a deliberate science policy society interface ensuring that our interventions are evidence informed, socially legitimate, economically viable and locally adaptable. We also have to champion constituency projects, community seeds banks, early warning systems, solar power driation and farmer education. Four priority actions for the last of the 10th assembly. One, approve and protect climate smart agriculture budgets. Two, legislate incentives for private sector in code chain renewable energy for agriculture. Three, mandate nutrition sensitive climate action through biofortified crops and food fortification. Four, establish a joint committee report on food systems and climate to be laid annually. Food system touch every aspect of human existence. The health of our food system profoundly affect the health of our body as well as the health of our environment, our economy and our culture. What we have been doing here with the support of the food systems coordination hub that I rep represent is discussing with government with stakeholders with civil society, private sector and our Rome based agencies FAO, EAD, WFP and the wider UN system is how are We going to make sure that uh we support the country in ensuring that that we get right the priorities to accelerate uh climate action and food systems transformation and achieve the goals that have been uh identified to be met by 2030.