The General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) and the Fisheries and Aquaculture Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), including its Mediterranean regional projects, are organizing in partnership with CIHEAM-Bari, MedPAN, WWFand in collaboration with the Government of Algeria a Regional Conference on “Building a future for sustainable small-scale fisheries...

Gender equality is a key to eliminating poverty and hunger, as it has been demonstrated by the FAO throughout its research worldwide. As part of the FAO efforts on generating evidence and knowledge, and in compliance with the FAO Policy on Gender Equality, the purpose of the Country Gender Assessment...

The purpose of this report is to provide insights into local transition pathways in the European food and nutrition security (FNS) landscape and will feed into the WP6 synthesis focused on the heterogeneity of FNS transition pathways. This report sets out to explore FNS pathways in UK with a focus...

Central Asia is geopolitically and strategically important because of its geographic position. The Central Asian states Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan are situated in the heart of the Eurasian continent and form a trade link between China, the Middle East, and Europe. Upon entering into membership in the Shanghai...

The opening ceremony and the inception workshop of the project “Agricultural Implication for Ecosystem Based Adaptation (EBA) to Climate Change in Steppe Ecosystems” will take place in Ankara, Turkey. Co-funded by the European Union and the Government of Turkey, the project aims to restore healthy ecosystems in Anatolian steppes and raise levels of...

The aim of this seminar is to bring together experts and researchers from the agriculture and food sectors to debate over methodological and empirical issues regarding relationships among Euro-Mediterranean countries on topics such as food policy, trade and marketing. This seminar will also focus on the topics of food security and...

Water scarcity is a pressing problem for the future of agriculture and food, but solutions are available for using water more efficiently. Vladimir Rakhmanin, FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Europe and Central Asia, shared some of those solutions with participants at the Budapest Water Summit 

The 16th Agricultural Policy Forum (APF), held in Tirana, Albania on 12 – 13 October 2016, brought together around 110 diverse stakeholders from 19 different countries/territories representing relevant international and regional institutions, governmental and non-governmental organizations and academic establishments. The main theme of the APF this year was Evidence – Based...

During the World Rural Forum representative Laura Lorenzo’s visit to Hungary, the National Committee on Family Farming showed great interest in providing continuity for the International Year of Family Farming through various action strategies such as the Directives on Family Farming. Using this approach, the National Committee is already working...

Agriculture is an important part of the economy in Central Asia and contributes significantly to the food security of the majority of population. Sustainable development of agriculture, increase of production and improvement of population welfare largely depend on soil condition and its fertility. Over the past decade, the agricultural lands,...

Productivity growth in the Turkish agricultural sector is supported today by better technologies, crop varieties and animal breeds. Yet improvements have slowed since the late 2000s, and the productivity gap between agriculture and the rest of the economy remains large. To overcome these challenges, Turkey will need to reduce the...

More than 50 percent of the world's population currently lives in urban areas and this is expected to rise to 70 percent by 2050, particularly in developing countries. Increasing effects of climate change, including storms, floods and other extreme weather events, pose an added threat to how people in cities, especially...

For the indigenous peoples of the Kamchatka Peninsula, the ‘fi sh province’ of the Russian Federation, fi ghting for their rights to access fi shing resources is crucial

Farmers, experts, policy makers, researchers, extension specialists, and NGO representatives learned techniques for minimizing the use of pesticides at a recent FAO workshop in Dushanbe. Some 70 participants – hailing from Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan attended the three-day event (15-17 August) on Integrated Pest Management (IPM).

Over the last few months I’ve been out and about with my camera profiling some of the small independent farmers and foodmakers who supply Farmdrop – a local food business on a mission to fix the food chain. In the first of the series I meet chicken farmers Nick Ball...

As the Coordinator of the H2020 project “Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas” (SIMRA), I am very pleased to share the news that the 1st Workshop of the H2020  SIMRA Social Innovation Think Tank (SITT) that took place on October 26th – 28th 2016 in Bratislava and was endorsed by...

Farms and communities in Turkey’s Anatolian steppe will soon have help in coping with the damaging impacts of climate change. A two-year, $3 million FAO project – co-financed by the European Union and Turkey – aims to restore healthy ecosystems, promote environmentally friendly agricultural practices, and raise levels of knowledge...

As farmers increasingly plant modern varieties of wheat, traditional wheat landraces are in decline. Yet the genetic diversity found in these hardy traditional varieties could be crucial for the future of wheat production. A new series of publications from FAO introduces wheat landraces in the Central Asia sub region, starting with...

Scarcity of both land and water – and the degradation of those natural resources – are a big issue for Armenia. Conservation agriculture offers solutions, and FAO and the European Union are responding to this priority need. FAO convened national and international experts earlier this month to discuss the country’s development...

Two key partnership programmes between FAO and the Government of Turkey – focused broadly on food security, rural poverty and forestry – were ratified recently by the Turkish Parliament and published last week in the Official Gazette in Ankara.  With a total US$ 20 million financial contribution from Turkey, the agreements will help...