Last year, Tunisia covered only 25% of its grain needs, according to agricultural policy expert Faouzi Zayani.
Speaking on Express FM, he stressed the need to develop a new vision to break away from dependence and achieve what is known as national food sovereignty.
He insisted on the right of citizens to adequate food, adding: “I call for the addition of an educational subject linked to food education, in the face of the continuing abandonment of green vegetables”.
He stressed that Tunisia is capable of achieving food security and that it has the mechanisms in place to achieve it by deploying human and material resources and energies.
He noted the decline in the area under grain due to the difficulties and the inability to make proper use of rainfall and to minimize losses in irrigation networks.
He also stressed the importance of renewable energies, which must be properly exploited to control costs, and the use of treated water that will have an impact on production.
“We are experiencing a real agro-economic crisis because agriculture’s contribution to GDP has fallen,” he said.
