AMMAN: Funding and water remain two problems to be tackled despite Jordan announcing a set of technical and bureaucratic procedures that constitute the foundations of a food security enhancement project.
The kingdom reached out to donors and international lenders to secure funding for the project, which also involves Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.
The Jordanian government’s establishment of a “food security council” to work alongside the National Committee for Food Security will help mitigate the country’s vulnerability to global food crises and climate change.
Jordan launched its 2022-2024 executive plan in late August, part of the 2021-2030 National Strategy for Food Security.
Prime Minister Bisher Al-Khasawneh has described the strategy as “the first of its kind in the kingdom, an implementation of King Abdullah’s directives to mark 2021 as a year of food security, and to make Jordan a regional model for food security.”
Al-Khasawneh said at the time that Jordan had taken a number of measures in food security which had resulted in upgrading Jordan’s ranking on the global food security index “to 49th worldwide in 2021 from the 62nd place in 2020.”
Agriculture ministers from Syria, Iraq and Lebanon have met recently in Amman and agreed to support Jordan’s initiative to host the regional observatory for food security.
Proposed by the World Food Program, the observatory for the Levant region aims at “monitoring variables related to food security, and following up on issues related to climate change, local productions and trade.”
WFP said that the Jordan-based observatory will also “provide accurate artificial intelligence-supported analysis that will enable policy makers in the Levant countries to formulate strategies related to food security.”
The meeting in Amman issued a communique which emphasized the need to enhance cooperation in food security, expertise, exchange, and integration, to address increased demand on food and price hikes.
Quest for funding
Jordan announced in April this year that it was negotiating with the World Bank a $480 million loan to fund its food security enhancement project.
However, four months later, the government said that it had failed to reach an agreement with the international lender.
Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Nasser Shraideh said in August that the government had reached “initial funding agreements” worth $430 million with other international lenders.
A source from the World Bank acknowledged the freezing of the loan agreement with Jordan but declined to say why.
A source, who preferred to remain unnamed, told Arab News: “There was no agreement with Jordan. The request for funding was under examination.”
An official Jordanian source, who also requested anonymity, said the World Bank turning down Jordan’s request was “probably due to the bank’s concerns regarding the kingdom’s debts.”
According to the World Bank’s reports on Jordan, a total of 15 funding projects have not been finalized between the two sides, or agreed with the government.
The latest to be canceled, according to the World Bank, was the $480 million emergency food security project, in addition to other funding agreements, including a loan of $100 million to finance an expansion of Jordan’s grain silos.
Jordan announced early in October that it would sign a new agreement with the European Investment Bank to provide €130 million to enhance food security.
Speaking to the government-run Al-Mamlakah TV, Shraideh said that the money would go to increase and sustain Jordan’s purchases of wheat and barley and to expand its storage capacity of the basic commodities.
Jordan and the OPEC Fund for International Development also signed a $100 million agreement to finance the emergency food security project. The government said that the deal fell within efforts to finance the purchase of basic commodities.
The minister added that a $200 million agreement was signed with the Islamic Development Bank Group, again to enhance the kingdom’s stocks of wheat and barley.
Shraideh hailed the government’s success in securing “abundant food supplies during hard times, primarily the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict,” thanks to recently erected silos and containers.
Water scarcity
However, Jordan’s food security strategy was inevitably challenged by the country’s limited water resources.
Classified as the world’s second most water-scarce country, experts nevertheless argue that Jordan, like many other countries, can overcome this dilemma by resorting to new agricultural models that use less water and focus on rainfed crops.
Acknowledging that no country can achieve food self-sufficiency, Hazem Al-Nasser, former minister of water, said that “the fact that Jordan and many other Arab countries are below the water poverty line” meant food production, particularly cereals, was a far-reaching objective.
In an article published recently, Al-Nasser wrote: “Declining levels of rainfall due to climate change will impact in the first place the production of rainfed cereals.
“Considering climate change impact and urbanization without proper mitigation and adaptation plans, this kind of rainfed agriculture will be phased out gradually.”
Al-Nasser listed a number of procedures and projects that, if implemented, can help Jordan and many other countries achieve food security, including the launch of awareness campaigns on rationalization of food consumption in the light of “sharp hikes in international food prices.”
Director of the National Agricultural Research Center Nizar Haddad said that Jordan has produced heat-tolerant wheat and barley varieties and has utilized modern biotechnologies that enable it to deal with water scarcity and expand the production of basic commodities.
Jordan leads regional project to enhance food security
https://arab.news/phnk6
Jordan leads regional project to enhance food security
- Kingdom announces it reached out to donors and international lenders to secure funding for project
- Prime Minister Bisher Al-Khasawneh has described the strategy as “the first of its kind in the kingdom”
Lebanon PM to visit new Damascus ruler on Saturday
- Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati will on Saturday make his first official trip to neighboring Syria since the fall of president Bashar Assad, his office told AFP
Mikati’s office said Friday the trip came at the invitation of the country’s new de facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa during a phone call last week.
Syria imposed new restrictions on the entry of Lebanese citizens last week, two security sources have told AFP, following what the Lebanese army said was a border skirmish with unnamed armed Syrians.
Lebanese nationals had previously been allowed into Syria without a visa, using just their passport or ID card.
Lebanon’s eastern border is porous and known for smuggling.
Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah supported Assad with fighters during Syria’s civil war.
But the Iran-backed movement has been weakened after a war with Israel killed its long-time leader and Islamist-led rebels seized Damascus last month.
Lebanese lawmakers elected the country’s army chief Joseph Aoun as president on Thursday, ending a vacancy of more than two years that critics blamed on Hezbollah.
For three decades under the Assad clan, Syria was the dominant power in Lebanon after intervening in its 1975-1990 civil war.
Syria eventually withdrew its troops in 2005 under international pressure after the assassination of Lebanese ex-prime minister Rafic Hariri.
UN says 3 million Sudan children facing acute malnutrition
- Famine has already gripped five areas across Sudan, according to a report last month
- Sudan has endured 20 months of war between the army and the paramilitary forces
PORT SUDAN, Sudan: An estimated 3.2 million children under the age of five are expected to face acute malnutrition this year in war-torn Sudan, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
“Of this number, around 772,000 children are expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition,” Eva Hinds, UNICEF Sudan’s Head of Advocacy and Communication, told AFP late on Thursday.
Famine has already gripped five areas across Sudan, according to a report last month by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a UN-backed assessment.
Sudan has endured 20 months of war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), killing tens of thousands and, according to the United Nations, uprooting 12 million in the world’s largest displacement crisis.
Confirming to AFP that 3.2 million children are currently expected to face acute malnutrition, Hinds said “the number of severely malnourished children increased from an estimated 730,000 in 2024 to over 770,000 in 2025.”
The IPC expects famine to expand to five more parts of Sudan’s western Darfur region by May — a vast area that has seen some of the conflict’s worst violence. A further 17 areas in western and central Sudan are also at risk of famine, it said.
“Without immediate, unhindered humanitarian access facilitating a significant scale-up of a multisectoral response, malnutrition is likely to increase in these areas,” Hinds warned.
Sudan’s army-aligned government strongly rejected the IPC findings, while aid agencies complain that access is blocked by bureaucratic hurdles and ongoing violence.
In October, experts appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council accused both sides of using “starvation tactics.”
On Tuesday the United States determined that the RSF had “committed genocide” and imposed sanctions on the paramilitary group’s leader.
Across the country, more than 24.6 million people — around half the population — face “high levels of acute food insecurity,” according to IPC, which said: “Only a ceasefire can reduce the risk of famine spreading further.”
Turkiye says France must take back its militants from Syria
- Ankara is threatening military action against Kurdish fighters in the northeast
- Turkiye considers the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces as linked to its domestic nemesis
ISTANBUL: France must take back its militant nationals from Syria, Turkiye’s top diplomat said Friday, insisting Washington was its only interlocutor for developments in the northeast where Ankara is threatening military action against Kurdish fighters.
Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan insisted Turkiye’s only aim was to ensure “stability” in Syria after the toppling of strongman Bashar Assad.
In its sights are the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) which have been working with the United States for the past decade to fight Daesh group militants.
Turkiye considers the group as linked to its domestic nemesis, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
The PKK has waged a decades-long insurgency in Turkiye and is considered a terror organization by both Turkiye and the US.
The US is currently leading talks to head off a Turkish offensive in the area.
“The US is our only counterpart... Frankly we don’t take into account countries that try to advance their own interests in Syria by hiding behind US power,” he said.
His remarks were widely understood to be a reference to France, which is part of an international coalition to prevent a militant resurgence in the area.
Asked about the possibility of a French-US troop deployment in northeast Syria, he said France’s main concern should be to take back its nationals who have been jailed there in connection with militant activity.
“If France had anything to do, it should take its own citizens, bring them to its own prisons and judge them,” he said.
Lebanese caretaker PM says country to begin disarming south Litani to ensure state presence
- Najib Mikati: ‘We are in a new phase – in this new phase, we will start with south Lebanon and south Litani’
DUBAI: Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Friday that the state will begin disarming southern Lebanon, particularly the south Litani region, to establish its presence across the country.
“We are in a new phase – in this new phase, we will start with south Lebanon and south Litani specifically in order to pull weapons so that the state can be present across Lebanese territory,” Mikati said.
Tanker hit by Yemen militia that threatened Red Sea spill has been salvaged
- The Sounion had been a disaster in waiting in the waterway, with 1 million barrels of crude oil aboard
- The Houthis have targeted some 100 merchant vessels with missiles and drones since the war in Gaza started
DUBAI: An oil tanker that burned for weeks in the Red Sea and threatened a massive oil spill has been “successfully” salvaged, a security firm said Friday.
The Sounion had been a disaster in waiting in the waterway, with 1 million barrels of crude oil aboard that had been struck and later sabotaged with explosives by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi militia. It took months for salvagers to tow the vessel away, extinguish the fires and offload the remaining crude oil.
The Houthis initially attacked the Greek-flagged Sounion tanker on Aug. 21 with small arms fire, projectiles and a drone boat. A French destroyer operating as part of Operation Aspides rescued its crew of 25 Filipinos and Russians, as well as four private security personnel, after they abandoned the vessel and took them to nearby Djibouti.
The Houthis later released footage showing they planted explosives on board the Sounion and ignited them in a propaganda video, something the militia have done before in their campaign.
The Houthis have targeted some 100 merchant vessels with missiles and drones since the war in Gaza started in October 2023. They seized one vessel and sank two in the campaign that has also killed four sailors. Other missiles and drones have either been intercepted by a US-led coalition in the Red Sea or failed to reach their targets, which have included Western military vessels as well.
The Houthis maintain that they target ships linked to Israel, the US or the UK to force an end to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the conflict, including some bound for Iran.
