The presentation of the candidacy of the current Minister of Agriculture, Luis Planas, for the general direction of the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) announces a probable diplomatic collision with the Italian Government, which has already formally protested to the Cypriot presidency of the EU, before Sánchez’s official announcement.
The Italian Government already expressed its discomfort weeks ago regarding Sánchez’s plans through a letter sent by the Italian Minister of Agriculture, Francesco Lollobrigida, to his Cypriot counterpart, Maria Panayiotu. In it, he accused Spain of wanting to establish a “food hegemony,” according to the newspaper La Razón.
Sources in Rome confirm that both governments pledged to support the Italian candidacy of the current Deputy Director-General of the FAO, Maurizio Martina, while Spain maintains its intention to support the reappointment of Álvaro de Lario as President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), given his “excellent work in facilitating countries’ access to resources.”
The Spanish Prime Minister took advantage of his presence at FAO headquarters in Rome yesterday to announce his government’s intention to nominate Luis Planas to lead the FAO. Pedro Sánchez defended his decision to promote Luis Planas, stating that he is a “strong candidate” to head the FAO. The Prime Minister added that “Spain, with its modest resources, has the strength of its actions and also the leadership of its people.”
Planas is a politician with extensive experience representing Spain abroad. A Member of the European Parliament from 1987 to 1993, he returned to Europe in 1996 as Chief of Staff to the then Vice-President of the Commission, Manuel Marín, and held the same position under Pedro Solbes. In 2004 he was appointed ambassador to Morocco and in 2010 Permanent Representative of Spain to the EU.
On the website of the Presidency of the Government, there is no reference to the announcement of Planas’s candidacy. But there is a long piece of information about Sánchez’s speech at the event ‘Food Security and Nutrition Under Pressure: Consequences of the Conflict in the Middle East.’
In that speech, he denounces “the use of hunger as a weapon to destabilize and subjugate and the consequences of the impact of wars on global food systems” and points out that the head of the Spanish Government “has held a meeting with the heads of the three United Nations agencies responsible for global food issues —FAO, IFAD, and WFP—”, to whom he conveyed that Spain’s commitment to these organizations “remains unbreakable.”
