Aida Baimakova is only 27 years old, but already a year has passed since the Slow Food congress elected her international councilor for Belarus, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Russian Federation, and Ukraine. On the eve of Slow Food’s annual “Terra Madre” ev

When the announcement was made that FAO regional offices around the world would each receive an additional US$ 1 million to advance food and agriculture priorities, the technical team in Budapest wasted no time in putting forward proposals for Europe and

Recognizing that the unregulated use of antimicrobials is a growing problem across Eastern Europe and Central Asia, FAO has been working hard to implement improvements across the region, with the support of the Government of the Russian Federation. One e

The green economy is creating new job opportunities in the forest sector in a variety of areas, such as recreation, leisure and sports, ecotherapy, urban forestry, and the control of pests, fire and disease. In this spirit, more than 30 forest experts fr

Humankind is in the midst of an unprecedented data-gathering and number-crunching effort, and national statistical offices are on the front line. Giorgi Kvinikadze is FAO statistician for the Europe and Central Asia region, based at the Organization’s re

Agribusiness representatives and agricultural trade experts from post-Soviet countries gather here this week for three days dedicated to agrifood trade. First up is the FAO-organized regional workshop on World Trade Organization (WTO) instruments, where

Smallholders and family farms are strongholds of food production, food security, and rural development. Without innovation, their important services cannot be secured for the long term. Representatives of governments, academia, civil society, and private

For three days, Tashkent is hosting an international conference to promote conservation agriculture in this corner of the world, organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Ministry of Agriculture of Uzbekistan.

Plant health and safety standards are indispensable. They ease safe international trade, help ensure food security, promote sustainable agriculture production, and help protect biodiversity and the environment. The primary guardians of plant health and s

FAO assists and advises on food security and nutrition, forest health, fisheries and aquaculture, climate change, plant and animal pests and diseases, international food trade, organic agriculture, rural livelihoods, and much more. Overseeing and setting priorities for this work in Europe and Central Asia is the job of the FAO Regional Conference for Europe. Convening every two years in a different location, the Regional Conference is a complex undertaking for both the host country and FAO's team in the region. Goran Stavrik, who has played a coordinating role in three consecutive conferences, reflects on the many behind-the-scenes factors that make for a successful FAO Regional Conference.