Traditional Lebanese Products on display at UNIFIL

Glass bottles from Sarafand on display at the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts during the International Day of Rural Women at UNIFIL HQ.

Visitors shopping at the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts at UNIFIL HQ in Naqoura.

Peacekeepers shopping at the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts at UNIFIL HQ in Naqoura.

Peacekeepers and staff shopping at the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts.

UNIFIL Force Commander visiting the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts during the International Day of Rural Women.

UNIFIL Force Commander trying a ‘Saj’ during the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts.

UNIFIL Deputy Head of Mission Imran Riza visiting the festival of Lebanese traditional food and handicrafts during the International Day of Rural Women.

previous next
16 Oct 2014

Traditional Lebanese Products on display at UNIFIL

On this year's International Day of Rural Women, 15 October, seventeen local Agricultural Cooperatives and Handicrafts Associations drawn from UNIFIL's Area of Operation participated in an exhibition organised at UNIFIL's HQ in Naqoura.

"We are proud because this is UNIFIL's contribution to improving the local economy," said UNIFIL Civil Affairs Chief, Albagir Adam. "Today, we are marking the International Day of Rural Women, a tradition that Civil Affairs revives for the women in the south."

Organic products, authentic Lebanese cuisine, glass articles, olive-oil soap and traditional hand-made decorative items were on display, highlighting the economic, cultural, social and environmental importance of the event.

Mr. Adam explained that UNIFIL Civil Affairs plays the important role of liaising and coordinating between cooperatives and banks, adding that holding exhibitions is a good marketing opportunity for the cooperatives because, "during these events our troops buy the products and get better knowledge of Lebanese culture."

"The more understanding our troops and local residents attain, the more successful the implementation of UNSCR 1701 and peace is," Mr. Adam added.

"Marketing our products without these exhibitions would be big burden for the cooperatives" said Khodor Sarhan from the Agricultural Cooperative of Kfar Kila .

UNIFIL Head of Mission and Force Commander Major-General Luciano Portolano during a tour of the exhibition said, "Through today's event, I realised that maintaining stability in the south of Lebanon will allow people to run their business and improve several aspects of their living."

"I'm very honoured that today I met people working hard to export the traditions of this wonderful country," noted Major-General Luciano Portolano.

Thanking UNIFIL for the initiative, a representative of Imam al-Sader Association underlined that these exhibitions are becoming platforms for introducing "our Lebanese traditional products to UNIFIL's troops who come from different countries."

UNIFIL's Deputy Head of Mission and Director of Political and Civil Affairs,Imran Riza said" there are a lot of important elements of what we are seeing today [...] On the one side, we got a lot of creativity.[...] It has also a sense of environmental concern, where people are doing a lot of traditional things but in an organic way [...].