The next Brussels Development Briefing will take place on 27th September, 2012, and  focus on ‘Climate change, agriculture and food security: proven approaches and new investments’.
It will address issues related to agriculture and food security in a changing climate, and how agriculture can increase resilience to climate change effects. In particular, it will: (i) raise awareness in ACP countries on the key challenges posed to agriculture by climate changes; (ii) increase exchange of information and expertise on strategies to develop climate-smart agriculture and proven successes; and (iii) facilitate networking among development partners.
The briefing, wich will be held on 27 September, 2012, will be organized in collaboration with the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS).
Around 120 ACP-EU policy-makers and representatives of EU Member States, civil society groups, research networks and development practitioners, and international organizations based in Brussels.

You can register at brusselsbriefings.net

You can follow the debate online by clicking here, as the event will be web-streamed.

Brussels will see the European Development Days 2012 (EDD12) in October.  Some of the focus areas of this two-day (October 16th and 17th) event will be sustainable agriculture, food security, resilience, inclusive growth and private sector engagement in international development.

During the course of a meeting in Paris, French President François Hollande and FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva stressed the need to work for better international coordination and increased information exchange, as these help ease tight markets.

Just weeks before the European Development Days 2012 is set to take place, Debating Europe raises awareness over food security. The platform, which aims to provoke as much back-and-forth discussion as possible between the readers and experts, asks: “How can we ensure greater food security for the world’s hungry? Could new technologies help us grow food more effectively? Or do we need to stop wasting so much food, and try to be more efficient in how we consume?”
Debating Europe will collect comments and take them to policy-makers and experts to hear their reactions.

European Parliament
-17/18 September :  Committee on International Trade
-17/18 September :  Committee on Development
-17/18 September :  Committee on Industry, Research and Energy
-17/18 September :  Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development
-19 September :  Committee on Foreign Affairs          
-19 September :  Committee on Fisheries
Council of Ministers
- 17 September: Informal Meeting of Energy Ministers (Nicosia)
- 18 September: Political and Security Committee (PSC)(Brussels)
- 19 September: COREPER I
- 19 September: COREPER II
- 20 September: Informal Trip COREPER I (Pafos)
ACP Group
- 17 September: Management meeting
- 18/21 September: 29th Session of the ACP PA and Inter-sessional meetings of the ACP-EU Joint PA
 Research events
- 20/21 September: 2012 Green Growth Investment Forum (GGIF) (Saint Lucia)

You can also read our newspaper “CTA Brussels Daily” (fed by our Twitter account), follow our new Facebook group CTABrussels and our Twitter account CTABrussels to receive up-to-date information on EU-ACP events.

According to an article by FAO press service, last month the Resource Mobilization and Operations Support Service of the organisation prepared a 2-day training on working with the EU, which is one of FAO’s most important resource partners. It has been the fifteenth in a series  that started in June 2011 with the first two workshops held in Accra, Ghana.

European Parliament
- 10/13 September :  European Parliament Plenary Meeting (Strasboug)
Council of Ministers
- 9/11 September: Informal Agriculture and Fisheries Council (Nicosia)
- 12 and 14 September: COREPER I
- 12 September: COREPER II
- 13/16  September: Informal Trip COREPER II (Pafos)
Research events
- 13/14 September: Workshop on "Wastewater Reuse Applications and Contaminants of Emerging Concern (Limassol)

You can also read our newspaper “CTA Brussels Daily” (fed by our Twitter account), follow our new Facebook group CTABrussels and our Twitter account CTABrussels to receive up-to-date information on EU-ACP events.

Following sharp price increases for some food products such as maize, wheat and soybeana, fears are mounting of a repeat of the 2007-2008 world food crisis. In light of some uneasiness, the Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nation (FAO), the President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme have issued a joint statement on international food prices.

Following some intensive discussion in Germany about discarding food, Ulrich Koester, examines the methodology of identification of food loss and the magnitude of estimated quantities and values. The post, published at the website ‘CAP reform’, questions whether a reduction of food loss on one side could mean  a decrease of hunger on the other. Based on a policy brief by IAMO in Halle, this review presents some alternative tools and approaches for combating hunger.

Following the authorisation of the Council of the European Union, the  Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, Kristalina Georgieva, signed the new Food Assistance Convention, on behalf of the EU. "The aim of the new Convention is to focus on the most vulnerable populations in an efficient and effective way using a bigger toolbox that now includes cash, nutrition, protection of livelihoods in emergency and recovery situations.”