Within the framework of the “Regional Initiative for Promoting Small-Scale Renewable Energy Applications in Rural Areas of the Arab Region (REGEND)” Project, the UN Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), in partnership with the Municipality of Akkar Al-Atika, is organizing a capacity-building workshop on “Financial Management, Accounting, and the Economic Benefits of Access to Sustainable and Secure Energy”.
 
This workshop will build the capacities of the rural women in Akkar Al-Atika in the fields of financial management, accounting, cost accounting, and pricing of rural products. The workshop will also demonstrate the economic benefits of sustainable and secure energy, and its positive impact on rural development in Lebanon.

As the world is still struggling to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and its disruptive impact on agricultural value chain, the private sector and farmers in the Arab region are facing burdens on how to continue delivering along the agricultural value chain and ensure the continuity of supplies to consumers, for sustaining their livelihoods, from farm to fork. The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) leads on this Zoominar session to highlight the role of the private sector in the use of innovation and technology and the potential role of the public-private partnership and regional cooperation in reaching out to smallholders and building their resilience to crises, disasters and COVID-19 pandemic. The session is being held within the context of the International Forum on “International Forum on Innovation in Agri-Food Systems to achieve SDGs”, that was planned to take place in Saudi Arabia in March 2020 in preparations for the G20 meeting in KSA.

Most Arab States depend for their water supply on shared water resources as two-thirds of all fresh water resources in the region cross one country border or more. The allocation of these resources among riparian countries has substantial environmental and socio-economic implications at the local, national and regional levels. Therefore, effective cooperation on the management and distribution of the scarce water supplies would contribute to the optimization in water resource allocation and use as well as alleviation of potential conflicts.

The Fifth Arab IGF seeks to strengthen dialogue on Internet governance priority areas for the region, as stipulated in the Second Arab Roadmap for Internet Governance.