Religions and faith based organisations have a role to play in taking care for food security. This was the key idea explored in conversations in a webinar held on 8 July, discussing how to enhance food security in the context of post-COVID-19 EU-Africa partnership.

The webinar co-organised by the Conference of European Churches, Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union (COMECE), Bahai International, Caritas Europa and Islamic relief featured an interfaith and intercontinental exchange with 30 participants.

They underlined that religions, ecumenical and interfaith organisations have a role to play, when it comes to raising concerns on how to guarantee food security for the most vulnerable.

The participants comprised of experts from a number of faith based organisations in Europe, Africa and Asia focusing on advocacy and policy recommendations, as well as practitioners having experience with community and grassroots work. The objective of the webinar was to map relevant questions related to food security and related to Europe – Africa relations on the background of continuing famine, food shortages and natural disasters.

The webinar was prepared in the run up to the 6th Summit between European and African Union due to take place in October 2020 focusing on the question of the investment-driven strategic priorities for the future EU-Africa partnership. It was considered how COVID-19 has raised additional question of how and in which form the knowledge coming from fresh experience can be added to the programme of the summit, in order to effectively address the crucial challenge of food insecurity, which is severely impeding human development.