U.S. ambassador to Rome food agencies celebrates July 4
July 07, 2015 |10:58 AM
David Lane, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations food agencies in Rome, welcomes guests to the Independence Day reception at his residence. The event was held Friday evening so people who work in the U.N. agencies could come after work. (Jerry Hagstrom/The Hagstrom Report)
ROME — David Lane, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations agencies in Rome, welcomed 600 people to his residence on Friday to celebrate Independence Day, and on Saturday presented an American flag to a Rome pub that had removed a Confederate flag from its wall at his suggestion.
The guests at his reception included representatives of the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Food Program and the International Fund Agricultural Development, ambassadors from other countries and others with interests in those agencies.
The event was held on July 3, so that the invitees could come after work rather than on Saturday, July 4.
In his remarks, Lane told the community of anti-hunger and agricultural development experts and activists that he views the American Independence Day as “a celebration of our common aspiration to improve the lives of our brothers and sisters all over the world.”
Lane, who was president and CEO of the ONE campaign and worked in the White House before being confirmed by the Senate to go to Rome in 2012, also said that the United States and the international community in Rome “have in common the belief that making agriculture more productive and sustainable is at the core of efforts to improve living conditions around the world.”
“This is not a new concept, rather a longstanding tenet that continues to inspire us,” he said.
“Thomas Jefferson, a founding father, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence (founder of the University of Virginia, where I was educated), and the third president of the United States wrote in 1787, ‘Agriculture . . . is our wisest pursuit, because it will in the end contribute most to real wealth, good morals and happiness.’ ”
He noted that the United States is pleased to participate in the U.N. system’s International Year of Soils, to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the United Nations, and to have a pavilion at the expo in Milan exploring how the world will feed 9 billion people by the year 2050.
After Lane’s remarks, attendees lined up for hamburgers and hot dogs and pizza from the residence’s pizza oven, while bands played late into the night.
In honor of the International Year of Soils, Lane served his guests a dessert of “dirt cups,” composed of chocolate pudding, ground Oreo cookies and a Gummi worm in a mold that looked like a small planter.
The temperature was over 90 degrees Farenheit with high humidity, but guests cooled off in front of Italfog machines, which spray a fine mist along with the breeze of a fan.
(According to the company website, the factory is located in Reggio Emilia, the province in northern Italy that is the home of Parmesan cheese, and its misting systems are also used in the produce sections of grocery stores in many countries.)
Cooling off at an Italfog misting fan are Josh Lozman, deputy director for program advocacy and communications at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, left, and Martin Frick, the director of the Climate, Energy and Tenure Division of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome. (Jerry Hagstrom/The Hagstrom Report)
At left: Marco Marzano de Marinis, the executive director of the World Farmers Organization, and staff members Gorgiana Pergolini, left, and Luisa Volpe attend the U.S. Embassy July 4 reception. At right: Jerry Hagstron says hello to Audrae Erickson of Mead Johnson at the U.S. July 4 reception. (Jerry Hagstrom/The Hagstrom Report)
