This paper describes how the social capital of rice farmers of the Mekong Delta of Vietnam, as manifested in the tradition of collective farming practice, has changed. Collective rice farming persisted for decades, irrespective of critical events that challenged its continuation, due to two key factors: the high need for...

FAO has a long history of cooperation with Vanuatu, a Pacific Island Country which joined the Organization in 1983 and, as of 2014, hosts a country office. Over the past three decades, FAO cooperation with Vanuatu has focused on agricultural data collection, strengthening capacities for local food production, developing market...

The Outer Island Food and Water Project (OIFWP) came into force in September 2014. Targeting the four outer islands of Abebama, Beru, North Tabiteuea and Nonouti, OIFWP promotes improved household food security and nutrition as well as clean water through rainwater harvesting and community planning and action activities. OIFWP aims to...

The many plants in Laxmi Acharya’s farm means that it is often mistaken for a miniature botanical garden. She needed more food for her family. But with so little land, she chose diversity.

From a situation of widespread undernutrition, consuming fresh vegetables all year round has now become a reality for many Nepali households thanks to their expanding home gardens. But the stories they tell show that the benefits of home gardens are not limited to improving household nutrition. The gardens also help...

The product of a two-year collaborative effort among Khon Kaen University, Thailand, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and other partners, this publication sheds light on the need to promote underutilized and indigenous food sources for overcoming malnutrition and hunger in the Asia-Pacific region. I sincerely hope...

The International Year of Family Farming was launched as part of a global campaign to reinforce awareness and support for small scale and family farmers around the world. The move to focus on family farmers for the international year was driven by strong advocacy from civil society, mainly the World...

FAO is warning that coconut farmers in the Philippines are in urgent need of assistance to recover their livelihoods, nearly three months after Typhoon Haiyan tore through the country. In this region alone, approximately 33 million coconut trees were damaged or destroyed and more than one million coconut farmers impacted....

Farms throughout Asia are predominantly small and family-based. In the past, small farms in tropical Asia achieved significant improvement in the yield of cereal crops, such as rice and wheat, which is dubbed the Green Revolution. As a result, grain production increased much faster than population growth, thereby contributing to...

The demand for food is expected to increase by over 60 percent over the next 40 years as the global population reaches 9 billion. FAO estimates that 91 percent of the increase in food production needed to meet this demand must come from yield increases based on advancements in agricultural...

The celebration of the IYFF (International Year of Family Farming 2014) gave impetus to a group of foundations to launch the European Foundations for Family Farming (E4F) initiative, with the support of the European Foundation Centre (EFC). This initiative seeks to raise the visibility of the family farming agenda among...

This book discusses the policy, strategic, methodological, technical and programmatic issues associated with food-based approaches, proposes “best practices” for the design, targeting, implementation and evaluation of specific nutrition-sensitive, food-based interventions and for improved methodologies for evaluating their efficacy and cost-effectiveness, and provides practical lessons for advancing nutrition-sensitive food-based approaches for...

Implementation Guidance for Policymakers and Investors

This publication is a report of the proceedings of the ICSF ‘s Puducherry  Workshop, which focused on the FAO's Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-scale fisheries in the context of food security and poverty eradication (SSG Guidelines). The workshop brought together 71 participants from 20 countries representing civil society organizations,...

Traditional fishworkers have long been forced to adapt to the forces of nature, and they are now confronted with the  new threats of climate change, global warming, sea-level rise and ocean acidification. What will be the potential impacts of climate change on the already vulnerable and marginalized small-scale fishing communities...

The International Year of Family Farming (IYFF) has uncovered well-grounded resolve to place family farmers as protagonists in addressing a number of challenges we face, from eradicating hunger and poverty to conserving natural resources. Nothing comes closer to the sustainable food production paradigm than family farming. The diverse set of...

The United Nations declared 2014 the International Year of Family Farming. Although many forms of production were once family-based, agriculture is now one of the few that are still dominated by families. Because family farms are so prevalent, making them more productive could help combat poverty and hunger in many...

This article discusses the different mechanisms that sustain labour-driven intensification in contemporary Chinese agriculture. They include: labour investments directed at improving resources; the intensification of cropping schemes; fine-tuning production processes, resulting in yield increases; embedded specialization; the reorganization of space; and on-farm processing, which gives more value-added per unit of...

The well-known deregulation of New Zealand agriculture prompted the growth of dairy farming, particularly in the region of Southland. The formation of the giant cooperative Fonterra only exacerbated the conversion of sheep farms into dairy farms that challenged both farmers’ and the region’s traditional identity as a sheep country. Interviews...

Globally, agriculture is facing enormous pressure to produce more food for growing population while it is increasingly getting affected by shrinking cultivable land area, water availability and climate change. With impressive economic growth, homogeneity of diets across countries has increased in the last 50 years and is pushing more and...