The Minister of Agriculture Abbas Hajj Hassan said that successful work is based on three principles: partnership, transparency and belonging.

He added: “One of the most important hurdles that we face daily is the problem of belonging to the homeland in its sadness and joy, as some have a problem in accepting the other’s belonging to the homeland.”

Haj Hassan said: “We in Lebanon have begun to get out of the crisis tunnel, and we will cooperate with all brothers and friends to overcome this catastrophic situation.”

Minister Hajj Hassan signed a memorandum of cooperation with Fair Trade Lebanon, within the framework of the Project to Business Innovation and Enhance Export for Lebanon (BIEEL) with the aim of promoting Lebanese agricultural and food products and helping local producers expand in foreign markets.

To achieve this, the two teams will cooperate together to organize many international exhibitions and trade missions to a number of countries that have promising markets for Lebanese products, to share the art of Lebanese cuisine, to facilitate exports, and to help local producers expand.

Both parties will also cooperate on empowering the beneficiaries and promoting their exports by organizing a number of workshops on several topics, including: food safety, export standards, and others. Both parties will also develop and design a national quality label for Lebanese agricultural and food products, defining the standards required of producers, and establishing a working mechanism through which producers wishing to benefit from this service.

In light of the economic crisis facing the country, this step is considered vital to support the food and agricultural sector in Lebanon and ensure the continuity of small producers and cooperatives.

It is noteworthy that BIEEL is a project launched by the US-Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) and implemented by the Fair Trade Organization in Lebanon, with the aim of providing support to local producers in the food and agricultural sector, helping them develop their businesses, increasing their exports and facilitating their access to markets.