CATIE Will Offer a Chair on Innovation in Agri-food Systems Named in Honor of Manuel Otero, Director General of IICA

• The Director General of CATIE, Luis Pocasangre, made the announcement during the 2024 meeting of the Executive Committee at IICA.
  
  

The Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE) announced the creation of the "Dr. Manuel Otero Inter-American Chair: Innovations in Agri-food Systems of the Tropics," in recognition of the Director General of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) and his more than 35 years dedicated to promoting and developing tropical and temperate agriculture in the Americas.

The Chair was unveiled by CATIE's Director General, Luis Pocasangre, before ministers and deputy ministers of agriculture from the region, during the 2024 Executive Committee meeting of IICA.

Luis Pocasangre, Director General of CATIE, made the announcement during the 2024 Executive Committee meeting. In the photo, seated at the main table, are José Abelardo Mai, Minister of Agriculture, Food Security and Enterprise of Belize; Lloyd Day, Deputy Director General of IICA; Manuel Otero, Director General of IICA; Ángel Manero Campos, Minister of Agrarian Development and Irrigation of Peru; and Héctor Iturbe, Technical Secretary of the Governing Bodies of IICA.

Manuel Otero was credited for his drive in strengthening research and innovation platforms such as the National Fund for the Reactivation and Modernization of Agricultural Activity (FONAGRO), the Regional Fund for Agricultural Technology (FONTAGRO), the Cooperative Program for the Development of Agri-food and Agro-industrial Technology in the Southern Cone (PROCISUR), the Regional Cooperative Program for the Development and Modernization of Coffee Production (PROMECAFÉ), and his push for joint actions with international research centers in support of food security, such as the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).

"First and foremost, Manuel is a notable CATIE graduate; he has positioned tropical agriculture on the global food security agenda and has also done extensive work in extension and capacity building, as well as in adapting tropical agriculture to new technologies," Pocasangre emphasized.

Additionally, CATIE’s Director General highlighted Otero's initiatives aimed at extension and training of agricultural producers from IICA's headquarters, such as the Digital Fabrication and Community Innovation Lab (FabLab-LINC) and the Center for the Interpretation of the Agriculture of Tomorrow (CIMAG).

He also underscored Otero's contribution to empowering rural women as managers of sustainable agricultural enterprises, as well as his support for rural youth through the use of technologies to increase the productivity of agricultural systems and continue producing healthy food for future generations.

Manuel Otero, a veterinarian from Argentina, emphasized the importance of inter-institutional alliances and expressed his gratitude for his time at CATIE: "I am a man who comes from temperate agriculture, and I want to acknowledge that moving from Buenos Aires to Turrialba changed my life. I fell in love and recognized CATIE as a fundamental institution that today plays an essential role because the future of humanity depends on the tropics."

The Dr. Manuel Otero Inter-American Chair: Innovations in Agri-food Systems of the Tropics was established because 39% of the world's agricultural area is located in these regions, which contain the greatest diversity of existing crops and are home to 40% of the planet's population.

CATIE is located in Turrialba, in a prolific agricultural production area of Costa Rica. Its campus is where the Inter-American Institute of Agricultural Sciences, created a year earlier, was inaugurated in 1943. This evolved into the current Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), whose headquarters are in the Costa Rican capital, San José