Guinea launches Codex Trust Fund project
Guinea launched its Codex Trust Fund 2 project at a workshop held on 14 and 15 May 2019, which was marked by the presence of the Secretary General of the Ministry of Industry and SMEs, the Minister's Adviser on responsibility for Quality and Innovation, the DG of the Guinean Institute for Standardization and Metrology, the President of the National Codex Committee and the participation of the relevant ministerial departments (health, agriculture, livestock, fisheries, environment, trade, finance, cooperation) as well as representatives of civil society and partners (WHO, FAO and UNIDO).
The overall objective of the Guinea project is to develop knowledge and consideration of Codex Alimentarius standards with a view to improving the conformity and competitiveness of food traded on local, regional and international markets.
The workshop was also an opportunity to review and validate several advocacy tools developed to raise awareness among different stakeholders across the country on the importance of Codex standards, one of the main objectives of the Codex project.
The Secretary General of the Ministry of Industry and SMEs thanked development partners, especially FAO and WHO for their support for capacity building and skills of actors in the food value chain. "The tools that will come out of your work, will serve as references for strong messages to the members of the government, the technical and financial partners and all the stakeholders for consideration in our programming, the activities of the Codex Alimentarius, its working bodies and the functioning of the National Codex Committee (CNC)", he said.
The Secretary General assured the participants that the government will spare no effort in deploying the tools at departmental level by including Codex activities in their annual budgets.