Food security has become an increasing concern among many APEC economies due to rising food prices and periods of price volatility. APEC economies face challenges related to the supply and demand for food. APEC members recognize that in the absence of any policy intervention, the cost of food could rise substantially due to increasing demand and reduced production.
In response, acknowledging the importance of the private sector in the food sector and their role in food security, the APEC Policy Partnership on Food Security (PPFS) was established in 2011 to strengthen public-private cooperation to address food security issues in the region. The PPFS focuses on promoting public-private partnerships and investments to ensure greater resilience in the food systems and ABAC’s recommendations for a whole-of-system approach for food production.
The ministers of APEC economies responsible for agriculture and food met for the first time in Niigata, Japan, in 2010 and issued the Niigata Declaration on APEC Food Security—the first comprehensive APEC plan for promoting regional food security.
Subsequent APEC ministerial meetings on food security were held biennially in Kazan, Russia (2012), Beijing, China (2014), and Piura, Peru (2016), which led to the Kazan Declaration, the Beijing Declaration and the Piura Declaration, which outline APEC’s new plans for tackling food security.
In 2021, with the forum gaining a new mandate to continue its contribution to Food Security until 2025, and in line with the APEC Putrajaya Vision 2040 (the successor of the Bogor Goals from 1994) of “an open, dynamic, resilient and peaceful Asia-Pacific community by 2040, PPFS along with the APEC Food Security Ministers Agriculture and food ministers jointly developed a Food Security Roadmap Towards 2030 (Roadmap 2030).
The Roadmap 2030 is aimed at enhancing an open, fair, transparent, productive, sustainable and resilient APEC food system that ensures access to sufficient, safe, affordable, and nutritious food to meet the dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life. The Roadmap 2030 has six key action areas: digitalization and innovation, productivity, inclusivity, sustainability, public-private partnership and SMART goals.
In 2022, the PPFS pursued meaningful dialogues with the public and private sector to ensure endorsement of an Implementation Plan of the Food Security Roadmap 2030, which utilizes a whole-of-systems approach for food security across the region and agri-food value chains, while recognizing the importance of digitalization and innovation, productivity, inclusivity, and sustainability towards this goal in line with APEC’s Putrajaya Vision 2040 and the Aotearoa Plan of Action.
In 2023, PPFS built on the APEC USA 2023 theme, Creating a Resilient and Sustainable Future for All, with specific focus on interconnectedness, innovation and inclusivity, and the agriculture sub-theme of Together Achieving Sustainable, Equitable and Resilient Agri-Food Systems and endorsed the Principles for Achieving Food Security Through Sustainable Agri-food Systems in the APEC Region. The document would represent the APEC community’s commitment to a common set of principles that can aid member economies in developing resilient agri-food systems and guide regional cooperation. Further, an initiative to create a compendium of best practices and practical applications after the conclusion of each workshop was started. The aim would result in a collection of reports or materials—or what we propose to refer to as “field guides”—that would be accessible, adaptable, customizable and achievable across the APEC region. All relevant stakeholders—particularly across fora and sub-fora focused on food and agriculture systems— also to the compilation of the field guides, including but not limited to the Agricultural Technical Cooperation Working Group (ATCWG) and the High-Level Policy Dialogue on Agricultural Biotechnology (HLPDAB).
Contacts
PPFS Chair
Program Director
PPFS Deliverables for 2024
Principles for Preventing and Reducing Food Loss and Waste
Reducing food loss and waste brings significant advantages to economies and benefits people. It helps enhance food security, reduce greenhouse gasses emissions, combat climate change, ease the burden on waste management, conserve land and water resources, among others. Therefore, prioritizing the reduction and prevention of food loss and food waste becomes a priority, since these issues have negative impacts on social, economic and environmental aspects.
In this matter, it is crucial to the APEC economies to adopt and implement a set of context-appropriate Principles to enhance our collaborative and individual efforts to improve food security, foster resilience, and enhance sustainability and equity in agri-food systems. These principles will be designed to serve as a foundation for a concerted effort to address this pressing issue, in order to facilitate economies’ ability to identify practical context specific strategies that can be adopted by member economies to prevent and reduce food loss and waste as discussed in the key action areas of the Food Security Roadmap Towards 2030 and its Implementation Plan.
Development of the APEC Ministerial Declaration on Food Security
As APEC host economy in 2024, Peru will organize the APEC Food Security Ministerial Meeting (FSMM) in August 2024 in the city of Trujillo. In anticipation of this event, the Peru PPFS chair and PPFS group will prepare and lead the development of a 2024 Ministerial Declaration for the endorsement of the food security ministers.
Review of the PPFS Terms of Reference related to public-private partnership engagement
The current PPFS’ Terms of Reference (ToR) adopted on 1 January 12021, will expire on 31 December 2025. A new ToR is to be drafted by the PPFS and will be reviewed by APEC senior officials for endorsement during APEC 2025, which will be hosted by Korea.
The need for this year’s review of how public-private partnership engagement is addressed in the TOR is established under 18b of the APEC Food Security Roadmap Towards 2030 Implementation Plan.
In SOM1, PPFS held an informal discussion among delegates and ABAC to review current ToR language and a proposed review plan. Intersessionally, virtual discussions were conducted among public and private sector representatives to brainstorm ways to improve collaboration within PPFS. In SOM3, a moderator will facilitate discussions that promote working-level, public-private partnership and discover ways to re-engage the private sector in the future PPFS.
Workshops and Events
SOM1: 1st PPFS Plenary Meeting (Lima, Peru/February)
- Side event: Dialogue of PPFS ToR
SOM3: Food Security Ministerial Meeting and related events (Trujillo, Peru/August)
- Workshop on preventing and reducing food loss and waste (FLW) to achieve sustainable food systems in APEC economies (PPFS 01 2023)
- Field trip related to the workshop on FLW (PPFS 01 2023)
- Workshop on Indigenous Research Network: The Power of Inclusivity (PPFS-ATC 01 2023S)
- Side event: Dialogue of PPFS ToR
- 2nd PPFS Plenary Meeting
- PPFS Joint Meeting (PPFS, HLPDAB, ATCWG, and OFWG)
- Food Security Ministerial Meeting (FSMM)
Other workshops
- 2nd APEC Seminar on Best Practices and Applications of Digitalization and Innovation in Food Supply Chain (PPFS 03 2023A)