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This publication contributes directly to SO1 and under Regional Initiative on Zero Hunger Challenge. Eradication of hunger and malnutrition is a major challenge in Asia. Dietary and production diversity are recognized factors in strategies to improve food security and nutrition. Currently, agriculture has an over-reliance on a handful of major staple crops. Agrobiodiversity offers huge potentials in addressing malnutrition and agricultural sustainability. Future Smart Food (FSF), often referred to as Neglected and Underutilized Species (NUS), are rich in Asia. They represent a promising abundance of food resources and constitute the bedrock of the food system diversity. FSF have enormous benefits [...]

This brochure presents FAO ’s work on agricultural innovation. FAO advocates a shift from interventions focusing on single components of agricultural innovation towards a system-approach aimed at strengthening institutions and stakeholders’ networks that better respond to the needs of smallholder farmers. Agricultural innovation is the process whereby individuals or organizations bring new or existing products, processes or ways of organization into use for the first time in a specific context in order to increase effectiveness, competitiveness, resilience to shocks or environmental sustainability and thereby contribute to food security and nutrition, economic development or sustainable natural resource management. Innovation is central to [...]

This Resource framework is intended as a guidance tool for stakeholders involved in programme design, implementation and monitoring of Home-Grown School Feeding Programmes and the related policy and institutional environment, including, inter alia: governments and development partners providing technical and financial assistance, as well as civil society, community based organisations and the private sector. It is a knowledge product that harmonizes the existing approaches and tools, and builds on the wealth of expertise and experience with home grown school feeding models i.e. those designed to provide children in schools with safe, diverse and nutritious food, sourced locally from smallholders, with [...]

The SNA methodology aims to capture the spatial dimension of food insecurity, shed light on how food systems work and understand what determines food security and nutrition levels in a given space and time. It is a first attempt to develop a methodological approach able to analyse the social, institutional and economic dimensions of food systems and their relationships with food security and nutrition outcomes, as well as to assess the spatial patterns of food systems. SNA also provides a useful tool to build scenarios to assess the effects of alternative policies on the configuration of the food systems as [...]

INPhO, the Information Network on Post-harvest Operations, aims at promoting good practices in post-harvest activities for agri-food products and to assist in the expansion of agribusinesses by providing access to technical data and information. 

Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) is experience-based measures of household or individual food security. The FIES Survey Module (FIES-SM) consists of eight questions regarding people's access to adequate food, and can be easily integrated into various types of population surveys The FIES-SM questions refer to the experiences of the individual respondent or of the respondent’s household as a whole. The questions focus on self-reported food-related behaviors and experiences associated with increasing difficulties in accessing food due to resource constraints.  During the last 12 months, was there a time when, because of lack of money or other resources: You were worried you would not have [...]

Livestock are terrestrial, domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide traction or produce commodities such as meat, milk, eggs and hides. They contribute to diverse agri-food systems globally, playing many roles for different groups of people. From the perspective of the sustainability of the global livestock sector, there are four important and interrelated aspects: food and nutrition security; livelihoods and growth; health and animal welfare; and climate and natural resource use. Sustainable livestock are at the interface of these four topics, which provide the structure of the breakout sessions in the 10th Global Forum for Food and Agriculture. This [...]

The FAO Blue Growth Initiative (BGI) can contribute to resilient communities to maintain and preserve cultural heritage through sustainable fisheries and aquaculture management for Indigenous Peoples. The Blue Growth Initiative seeks to balance the sustainable management of aquatic resources with economic and social benefits for local communities through traditional knowledge and practices, capacity development and knowledge sharing, food security and nutritional benefits, and an increased voice in resource management and policymaking. Blue Growth will support Indigenous Peoples in achieving the 2030 Agenda across multiple SDGs and targets. This infographic will highlight targetted regional facts on Indigenous management and benefits derived [...]

Fisheries and aquaculture support the livelihoods of millions of people around the world. In rural and coastal communities they often play a key role for a society’s culture and identity. As these communities know well, fish is also a healthy and nutritious food, with the potential to feed our growing planet. But as the population grows, the demand for fish increases, and our natural resources are increasingly stressed. Sustainable management and development is crucial to preserving these resources for future generations.  Like the Green Economy principles that preceded it, FAO’s Blue Growth Initiative emphasizes the three pillars of sustainable development – [...]

A repository of national and thematic food composition tables, completed by an online library of methodological guidelines and user guides. It was first compiled in 1988 and most recently updated in 2018.