The Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) held its 7th Summit on 14 October 2002 in Istanbul, Turkey, attended by heads of the organization's 10 member countries—Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The Summit marked the 10th anniversary of ECO. ECO has a bilateral agreement with ICARDA. Within the agreement's framework of multidimensional regional cooperation for sustained socioeconomic growth in the member countries, ICARDA's Director General, Prof. Dr Adel El-Beltagy, was invited to participate and make one of four presentations scheduled from heads of international organizations, including United Nations agencies and international non-governmental organizations.
    Prof. Dr El-Beltagy made an illustrated presentation on ICARDA's work in ECO member countries, with special emphasis on the Center's work in Afghanistan and the Central Asian Republics. He also took the opportunity to personally brief the Heads of States and government cabinet members about ICARDA's work and the benefits of collaboration.
    Fruitful discussions were held with the President of Iran, who expressed great appreciation for ICARDA's on-going work in his country, with which he was already familiar.
    A meeting with Mr Hamid Karzai, President of Afghanistan, focused on the follow-up actions being taken by ICARDA since the Director General's last meeting with President Karzai in Kabul in October.
    The Director General also had discussions with the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kyrgyzstan; had a brief meeting with President Parvez Musharraf of Pakistan; and had discussions with the Minister of Science and Technology and Education, Pakistan.
    ICARDA has been collaborating with ECO in developing joint activities in support of agricultural development in the member countries. This has assumed greater importance since the Ministerial Meeting of ECO on Agriculture, held in July 2002 in Islamabad, which reviewed the challenges confronting the ECO countries in agriculture, and the state of their economies. The member countries have agreed to develop an ECO Strategy for Agricultural Development and Food Security. Iran has volunteered to coordinate with other countries on drought management; Pakistan on water management; and Turkey on trade promotion and development of post-harvesting and processing industries.
    The importance of ICARDA's collaboration with the ECO member countries in these efforts was reiterated at the Summit.

ICARDA's (www.icarda.org) mission is to improve the welfare of people and alleviate poverty through research and training in dry areas of the developing world by increasing production, productivity, and nutritional quality of food, while preserving and enhancing the natural resource base. ICARDA is a Future Harvest Center.