Centre on Integrated Rural Development for Asia and the Pacific (CIRDAP) and Asian Productivity Organization (APO) formally embraced the partnership with the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for a further three years to bolster the bilateral affiliation and support the collaborative capacity-building initiatives in the Asia-Pacific region.
The MOU was signed after a bilateral meeting during the 59th Workshop Meeting (WSM) of Heads of National Productivity Organizations in Yogyakarta, Indonesia on 2-4 October 2018. The agreement was officially signed by APO Secretary- General Dr. Santhi and CIRDAP Director General Tevita G. Boseiwaqa Taginavulau. In essence, CIRDAP acknowledged and expressed its deep gratitude to APO for having the trust and confidence in CIRDAP to continue working in collaboration.
APO and CIRDAP have been working in collaboration particularly through International Training Programme on thematic topics under SDG1: End Poverty in all its forms everywhere and SDG 2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture over the last three years.
DG CIRDAP, in his speech, delivered that “we are proud to confidently say that we have achieved the common objectives as specified in the last MOU basically by fulfilling the agreed contributions to each programme activity. We reaffirmed our commitment towards the achievement of SDG 1 and SDG 2, amongst others and our own institutions’ mandated roles by renewing the partnership through MOU. In addition, “We have been certainly governed by the spirit of SDG 17: Strengthen the areas of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development”, he stated.
CIRDAP has more to gain from this partnership as it is intertwined with the opportunity to broaden its visibility to the seven APO member countries who are not CIRDAP members as well as the thirteen CIRDAP member countries who are also APO members through the high level of International Training Programmes”.
It is, therefore, evident that this MOU will set the platform to explore the other areas of collaboration apart from International Training Programme with more successes.
Director General of CIRDAP Mr. Tevita G. Boseiwaqa Taginavulau (2nd from left) and APO Secretary-General Dr. Santhi (2nd from right) during the 59th Workshop Meeting of Heads of NPOs in Japan
