By Abigirl Tembo, Health Editor
ZIMBABWE is working with Egypt to reactivate Memoranda of Understanding covering critical economic areas of development including unlocking opportunities in agriculture.
Discussions to revisit the existing memorandum of understanding between Egypt and Zimbabwe were started at the just concluded Nutrition Summit In Cote d’Ivoire.
Egypt’s Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation Mr Elsayed Elkosayer, who met with his Zimbabwe counterpart Dr Anxious Masuka on the sidelines of the summit , said his country will be reactivating existing instruments while also looking at new areas of cooperation in agriculture.
“I am very happy to have met with the Honourable Mnister from Zimbabwe. Egypt is very determined to cooperate with our brotherly and sisterly African countries. We discussed with the Honourable minister how we could promote fisheries in Zimbabwe, revamping orrigation systems, capacity building also, coordination also in agriculture research and applied research in the field of agriculture and also explore means of how to corporate to implement the decisions taken at the COP 27 in relation to agriculture. We agreed to reactivate MOUs that were signed between both countries long ago so that we update them and sign new memoranda of understanding to boost our cooperation in the field of agriculture,” he said.
Zimbabwe is optimistic of deriving value from Egypt’s expertise in the fields of fisheries and Irrigation.
“The context is that Zimbabwe and Egypt are rebuilding and re-establishing very strong mutually beneficial relationships led by the two presidents and we reviewed COP 27 the recent outcomes and the loss and damage fund that was put in place. We also looked at agriculture now being considered as a separate and discussable item on subsequent missions, this is great because the small holder farmers are the most affected by climate change and they have the least capacity to respond and they have not caused a problem.
“We also then looked at the MOU that was consummated a long time ago so we agreed to resuscitate this and we also discussed certain areas of corporation among them the supporting for the Presidential community fisheries programmes. We also looked at their Irrigation efficiencies and in that vein we said under the accelerated Irrigation development programme we would like their technology and assistance in training and research and development to be able to bring the additional area that we want Irrigation,” said Hon Masuka.
Egypt’s economy relies heavily on agriculture, making it the third largest economic sector employing almost half of the country’s population.
