“Regenerative Practices, Waste-to-Resource Technologies, and Sustainable Agri-Food System Transformation” – Thailand Pavilion, Blue Zone, 13th November 2025

At the Thailand Pavilion, COMSATS, in collaboration with the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO), Morocco; the International Centre for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA); and the Food Security and Agriculture Centre of Excellence (FACE), Pakistan, convened a pivotal dialogue on “Regenerative Practices, Waste-to-Resource Technologies, and Sustainable Agri-Food System Transformation.” The session served as a strategic platform for interrogating the scientific, technological, and governance prerequisites for scaling climate-resilient, low-emission agri-food systems across developing regions.

Opening the proceedings, Ambassador Dr. Mohammad Nafees Zakaria, Executive Director COMSATS, underscored the global imperative of transitioning toward sustainable agri-food systems capable of reconfiguring how societies produce, consume, and coexist with natural ecosystems. He highlighted the transformative value of regenerative agriculture, precision farming, agricultural drones, and Waste-to-Resource technologies, encompassing microbial and biological treatments, landfill gas-to-energy systems, and biomass gasification, emphasizing that such innovations can reinforce food security, enhance climate resilience, and ensure dignified nutrition for vulnerable populations.

Dr. Muhammad Sharif, Advisor for Science and Technology at ICESCO, advanced the argument that scientific rigor, research-driven innovation, and regional knowledge exchange must form the bedrock of regenerative and circular transitions, particularly for countries navigating the dual pressures of climate vulnerability and resource scarcity. Complementing these perspectives, Mr. Hassan Akram, Chief Operating Officer FACE-FFC Pakistan, stressed the necessity of strong institutional support, coherent policy frameworks, and inclusive governance to scale sustainable agricultural practices, asserting that empowered farmers, public-private partnerships, and aligned institutions are essential for achieving climate-smart and resource-efficient agri-food systems.

Moderated by Mr. Hamid Majid Abbasi, Senior Executive FACE-FFC, the expert panel brought together Dr. Rabeb Aloui, Director BNCheck; Dr. Sohail Malik, Team Lead Climate Resource Coordination Center (CRCC) Pakistan; and Ms. Thunpicha Greigarn, Climate and Inclusion Specialist, who collectively examined the technical and institutional complexities of deploying biochar, vermicompost, microbial soil restoration, and food-waste reduction technologies in developing countries. Their dialogue addressed the systemic constraints of financing, institutional fragmentation, and limited data integration, while also considering the enabling role of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Dr. Aloui emphasized the centrality of journalism, public media, and community-level platforms in shaping inclusive and evidence-based narratives on regenerative agriculture and waste-to-resource transitions, noting that inter-ministerial communication hubs, public awareness frameworks, and participatory engagement mechanisms strengthen public trust, policy coherence, and the social legitimacy of low-emission solutions. Dr. Malik identified methane-monitoring data gaps as a critical constraint to meeting Enhanced Transparency Framework (ETF) requirements under the Paris Agreement, underscoring that national coordination bodies such as CRCC can mobilize academia, municipalities, and private-sector operators to jointly pilot biochar, composting, and microbial soil restoration initiatives that deliver both emissions reductions and adaptation co-benefits.

Ms. Greigarn highlighted that climate-smart agricultural transitions must be economically viable and socially equitable, particularly in contexts where ageing farmers are already burdened by competing livelihood pressures; she stressed that stronger inter-agency coordination among agriculture, environment, finance authorities, and local administrations is essential to ensure that adaptation and decarbonization responsibilities do not fall disproportionately on farmers.

The session also integrated forward-oriented thematic questions posed to the speakers, broadening the dialogue toward COP30 and future multilateral workstreams. These included how water–energy–climate nexus approaches can underpin regenerative agriculture in arid regions where water reuse, biogas recovery, and soil restoration intersect; what types of regional and cross-sectoral partnerships between utilities, farmers, and clean-tech innovators are needed to convert organic waste and wastewater into local sources of energy and nutrients; what practical steps can bridge methane-monitoring data gaps across agriculture and waste sectors to strengthen evidence-based ETF reporting; how national coordination mechanisms can catalyze joint pilots on biochar, composting, and microbial soil enhancement; what measures can alleviate the adoption barriers of climate-smart agriculture in ageing rural communities; and which institutional mechanisms or policy instruments can bridge governance gaps so that low-carbon transitions are shared equitably rather than imposed on farmers alone.

Taken together, the session illuminated a unified message: accelerating regenerative and circular agri-food transformations requires coordinated innovation, strengthened governance, and equitable policy design. The dialogue concluded with a shared call to intensify collaboration, address systemic constraints, and ensure that climate-smart agri-food systems deliver tangible and just outcomes for communities, especially those most exposed to climate impacts.

A significant intervention from the floor further enriched the discourse: a participant emphasized the critical need to make regenerative agriculture accessible to smallholder farmers through localized training programmes, open-source agronomic tools, and youth-led innovation ecosystems. The participant noted that meaningful transformation requires not only advanced technologies but also community-level capacity building and simplified, affordable solutions that farmers in developing countries can practically adopt. It was highlighted that establishing demonstration sites, fostering farmer-to-farmer learning networks, and integrating traditional ecological knowledge with modern scientific approaches can markedly accelerate the transition toward climate-resilient, low-emission agri-food systems.