Dakar (AFP)
The Senegalese politician and diplomat Jacques Diouf, who was Director-General of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) from 1994 to the end of 2011, died at the age of 81, announced Senegalese President Macky Sall.
"Senegal has lost one of its most valuable sons with the death of our compatriot Jacques Diouf, he was an effective collaborator for me at the beginning of my first term," Senegalese head of state said on Twitter. his condolences.
Born August 1, 1938 in Saint-Louis (northern Senegal), a diplomat known for his pragmatism, Diouf died in France after a long illness, said his family, quoted by Senegalese media.
Married and the father of five children, Jacques Diouf had a post-graduate education in France (diploma of agricultural engineer, master of tropical agronomy, doctorate in social sciences) completed by a higher diploma of management in New-York.
Appointed Secretary of State for Scientific Research of Senegal by President Léopold Sédar Senghor in 1978, he was deputy for Saint-Louis from 1983 to 1984.
He then left Senegal to work at the International Development Research Center in Ottawa, at the Central Bank of West Africa, before becoming, in 1991, his country's ambassador to the United Nations in New York. York.
Elected to head FAO in 1993, he was to serve three six-year terms. Under his leadership, the UN organization sought the collaboration of the private sector and stars by launching spectacular operations to raise funds on the occasion of World Food Day.
We must "let humanity know that it is no longer possible to treat these vital resources as if they were infinite," he said about the degradation of land and water in one his most recent interventions as Director General of FAO in November 2011.
"The era of + business as usual + is over," he warned.
That same year, while the famine was raging in the Horn of Africa because of an exceptional drought, Mr. Diouf said he could not bear to "see the image of a child who is likely to starve", adding: "We would not wish that for our children, I do not see why we would accept it for the children of others".
© 2019 AFP