Work for 2022
Rachid El Abdi
President of ORU Fogar
The year 2022 should be the year of overcoming the Covid-19 pandemic, so that we can all rededicate ourselves to achieving the goals of the 2030 Agenda. The regions must make a special effort to recover from the economic and social consequences of the pandemic.
As the United Regions Organization, ORU Fogar, we will strive to share good practices. In May 2020, when the pandemic was just beginning, we organized "Shall we connect?". An online space to share experiences on how the regions faced that unprecedented situation. It is a shared opinion that it was a successful and useful exercise. This new year 2022, we invite you to repeat with "Shall we connect? 2”, to share and exchange experiences and good practices on how members of our organization will continue to address this phase of the pandemic. In 2020 the health issue was central, due to the consequences of the health crisis and, thus, we were invited to give answers through the exchange of our experiences. Today, instead, we are called to discuss more about the economic reactivation and how we recover social life that has been interrupted by Covid-19.
In 2022, we will also try to generate synergies among our partners. Beyond the strength that ORU Fogar accumulates to defend the interests of the regions at the local level, cooperation between our members offers us many opportunities. In this complex situation in which COVID-19 places us, we must take advantage of these potentialities. Indeed, it will be very important to sign collaboration agreements between us to develop complementarities and common work agendas.
As usual, at the beginning of this year 2022, we will announce -in alliance with UNDP- the VII Regional Best Practices Award. These regional good practices, as always, will be evaluated by an independent jury. After six editions, no African region has won the award, so we will ensure that the call is widely disseminated in all African regions to ensure a large number of participants.
Obviously, ORU Fogar will remain attentive to all the events on the global agenda. As an Organization, however, we have the challenge of successfully organizing the “IV Zero Hunger Regions Summit” to be held in Peru. If the food issue was already a challenge before the pandemic, achieving the SDGs today is a greater challenge. And ORU Fogar, who has been working on this issue since 2008, must be at the forefront of this fight. At our annual meeting in November 2021, the Mancomunidad of the Andes assumed the presidency of the Côre Group for Food Sovereignty. This group needs to accelerate and be a catalyst for the organization. The Mancomunidad and the Peruvian Region of Huancavelica are committed to organizing the summit in 2022. The whole organization and all our members must give our full support for this event.
From December 12 to 14, 2022, the High-Level Meeting of the Global Alliance for Effective Development Cooperation will take place. ORU Fogar has been fully involved in the debate on the effectiveness of cooperation since the Busan Summit (South Korea) in 2010. Since 2014, our Organization has been part of the Global Alliance, so we must be strongly present to adopt a very firm position that will allow us to defend the territories and regional governments in everything related to development.
Happy New Year to all the members of ORU Fogar with our sincere wishes that this year 2022 will be favorable for all of you.
