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APRP Steering Committee Meeting was held on 26 February 2004 in Aleppo, Syria. The meeting was attended by 17 participants, representing 6 countries from the Arabian Peninsula, two donors and ICARDA. In his opening address, Dr William Erskine (ADG-Research), on behalf of Prof. Dr Adel Al Beltagy, welcomed the Donor representatives Mrs. Ekhlas Najib (OPEC Fund) and Mr. Samir Jarrad (Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development-AFESD) and the participants from Bahrain, Emirates, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia and APRP. He emphasized the importance of the meeting as APRP is coming to its final stages where the guidance of the steering committee is expected to have most significant role.

Dr Ahmed Moustafa, APRP Regional Coordinator, and Dr Ahmed Osman, Pasture and Rangeland Specialist, presented the summary of APRP activities and achievements during the last year. The donors and country representatives endorsed the extension of the project for another year (2005) with no additional funds. AP country representatives also appreciated donors for their contributions and support for APRP and emphasized the importance of the project continuation for research and development activities in the region. At the end of the meeting Mrs Ekhlas Najib (OPEC-Fund representative) indicated that although the contribution of OPEC Fund is small, she felt that the Fund is participating in the big success of APRP. Mr Samir Jarrad (AFESD) expressed his appreciation to ICARDA and assured the meeting of the Arab Fund’s interest in the program with special attention and support for training and capacity building in the region. In the last session, the time and location for the next Technical and Steering Committee meetings were decided to be in October 2004 in Oman. These meetings were held in Oman as agreed but the time was moved to 13-17 February 2005.

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