World leaders at the 2021 G20 Rome summit declared support for “sustainable and resilient food systems and agriculture innovation … reducing food loss and waste along the food value chain.”
They made this statement in the G20 Rome Leaders’ Declaration, released following the summit, held in Rome, Italy, October 30-31.
The G20, or Group of Twenty, is composed of the world’s largest economies, accounting for around 90% of gross world product and 75-80% of international trade.
“We recognize,” the statement continues, “that promoting sustainable food systems, including by strengthening global, regional and local food value-chains and international food trade, will contribute not only to food security, but also make a major contribution to tackling the interlinked global challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss.”
Role of NatRefs
Natural refrigerant technologies are the focus of several sustainable food cold chain development programs being implemented in developing countries today, including one in the Philippines.
The Cold Chain Innovation Hub (CCI-Hub), a Philippines-based center for sustainable food cold chain technology exhibitions and training, counts CO2 (R744) and propane (R290) refrigeration systems among the first contributions made by technology suppliers to the initiative.
The contributions were announced in a webinar held on September 27.
CCI-Hub was launched in 2019 as part of an initiative to upgrade the food cold chain in the Philippines. This initiative, the Global Partnership for Improving the Food Cold Chain in the Philippines, is jointly led by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the Filipino Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). ATMOsphere, publisher of this website, is one of the project’s key executing partners.
