Ensuring better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life – the “four betters” – in Europe and Central Asia is the end goal as discussions continue on the second day of the Regional Conference for Europe in Lodz, Poland. Today, FAO Members in the region have the possibility...

Peasant agroecology supports life-enriching systems and opposes life-alienating systems. It offers solutions to the major environmental, social, economic and political challenges we are facing today. It is a living practice, as well as a science and a socio-political movement, built and fostered by people over thousands of years. For aeons...

We are excited to announce that Access Agriculture podcasts are now available in English (https://accessagriculture.podbean.com/category/english/) and French (https://accessagriculture.podbean.com/category/french/). It is a great way to listen to farmers and experts from around the world talk about the topics you care about, as we have repurposed summaries of our popular videos as...

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) launched a new project in the Republic of Tajikistan to improve regulations for the protection and sustainable use of agrobiodiversity and traditional knowledge on the topic. The three-year undertaking, “Facilitating agrobiodiversity conservation and sustainable use to promote food and nutritional...

  Agriculture is a major threat to global biodiversity. A common claim is that large-scale agro-industrial farming is mainly responsible for the biodiversity decline, while smaller family farms are more wildlife friendly. Here we leverage a natural experiment along the former inner German border to estimate the causal impact of farm...

The project "Increasing longevity of Swiss dairy cows" aims to develop concrete strategies for optimizing longevity in collaboration with farmers.

In the countries of Europe and Central Asia, about half of the population lives in rural territories, with those people who produce the food we eat among them. Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and addressing the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the impacts of the ongoing war...

To address the impacts of the war in Ukraine on the global agricultural sector, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has launched a new $17 million project to help Ukrainian farmers save the upcoming harvest in July-August while ensuring export of critical agricultural goods to international...

Life in rural areas has its beauties and hardships. Yet, Qyaram Khachatryan said he would never want to exchange his village life in northern Armenia for living in a city, even after he lost virtually everything in the devastating earthquake of 1988. Lost everything but his good spirit and hope,...

The first UN Food Systems Summit will have a long-lasting impact on a global scale, despite the other historic events of 2021. This echoes across Europe and Central Asia, giving an impulse to a side event at the Regional Forum on Sustainable Development on the role of sustainable food systems in building back better in Europe...

The war caught Larysa Zueva while she was working a shift at a psychiatric hospital in Mariupol in southeastern Ukraine. She spent more than a month with her grandson in the hospital's shelter with about 200 other people. Despite the attacks, her work at the hospital continued. When the gas...

Sustainable fisheries management starts with scientific research – and an enormous amount of it is taking place across the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, supported by the GFCM. Small-scale fishers have a central role to play in the monitoring and data collection activities that inform the work of fisheries scientists,...

FAO experts have been visiting farms across Montenegro this week, to collect up-to-date information and data to be fed into the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) system. Established by the European Union in 1965, the Farm Accountancy Data Network allows farm managers to keep track on their transactions at farm level...

There is growing momentum behind a shift to ‘regenerative’ agriculture in the UK, which can help to mitigate the climate crisis, say leading experts in the sector. “More and more people are seeing other farmers doing it [regenerative farming] and are happier for it,” said John Cherry, who founded Groundswell, the UK’s...

CZU mobiLAB (developed at Czech University of Life Sciences Prague) represents a complex solution that enables the application of state-of-the-art molecular detection methods in remote or inaccessible areas. The principal advantage of the proposed solution is the concept of a mobile laboratory, which is unique in terms of its size...

The aim of this report is to analyse recent agricultural policy developments in the countries/territories of the Western Balkans (WBs) and Turkey and their state of harmonisation with the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the EU. The report provides both comparative cross-country analyses and a more detailed assessment in the...

This facilitator’s guide for sheep-related Farmer Field Schools (FFS) has been developed for the FAO project UTF/AZE/009/AZE, “Development and application of sustainable sheep production and food value chains”, in Azerbaijan. In Azerbaijan, small ruminant production plays an essential role in the livestock sector as it provides income for rural families...

Explore the diverse work done by the FiBL Group (FiBL Switzerland, FiBL Germany, FiBL Austria, FiBL France, the Hungarian ÖMKi and the Brussels based FiBL Europe) performs on both national and international level. Engage with FiBL experts, giving insights into their activities and latest developments on organic and sustainable production,...

We connect universities and research institutions! The platform aims to strengthen the capacities and cooperation of young teachers, researchers and masters and doctoral students at selected Ukrainian universities by creating a platform – AgriSciences Platform for sharing information on Agrarian Sciences.

The dossier explains the basics of organic farming and shows how they are applied in practice. The publication is a valuable source of information for farmers interested in conversion to organic farming. It also serves as a guide for the private sector, government representatives, non-governmental organisations and other interested parties...