The 35th Governing Council meeting of the Common Fund for Commodities took place on November 21 – 22 2023 at the Hague, Netherlands. The Governing Council deliberated on how to strengthen its position in supporting the commodity producing countries in terms of know how, value addition and sustainable market. The Governing Council also re-elected H.E. Ambassador Sheikh Mohammed Belal of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh as the managing director of the CFC to serve for the next four years and H.E. Mrs. Margaret Wambui Ngugi Shava, the Ambassador of the Republic of Kenya to the Netherlands to be the chair of the Governing Council for the year 2024.
In her remark at the meeting, H.E. Ambassador Hirut Zemene highlighted, among others, the potential Ethiopia has in the commodity sector and the efforts and achievements of the government of Ethiopia to fully utilize the potential. Acknowledging the support of CFC to smallholder farmers and SMEs in Ethiopia, the ambassador stressed for the importance of strengthening cooperation with view to enhance financial and technical assistance to SMEs that will enable them to value addition and sustainability.
CFC is a multilateral institution established in 1989 targeting smallholder farmers and SMEs of developing countries engaged in the commodity sector. Since its establishment, the organization has been supporting commodity producers with financial and technical assistance for the development of the sector in pursuit of realizing its vision of “strengthening and diversifying the commodity sector in developing countries and transforming it to be a major contributor to poverty alleviation and sustained economic growth and development”. The organization had supported more than 25 projects in Ethiopia, focusing on the production, marketing, and value addition of various commodities such as coffee, leather, fruits, and vegetables.
