The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and improve nutrition and food security. Its Latin motto, fiat panis, translates to "let there be bread". It was founded in October 1945.
The World Food Programme (WFP) is the food-assistance branch of the United Nations. It is the world's largest humanitarian organization, the largest one focused on hunger and food security, and the largest provider of school meals. Founded in 1961, it is headquartered in Rome and has offices in 80 countries. As of 2019, it served 97 million people in 88 countries, the largest since 2012, with two-thirds of its activities conducted in conflict zones.
A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, raising living organisms for food or raw materials. The term usually applies to people who do some combination of raising field crops, orchards, vineyards, poultry, or other livestock. A farmer might own the farmed land or might work as a laborer on land owned by others, but in advanced economies, a farmer is usually a farm owner, while employees of the farm are known as farm workers, or farmhands. However, in the not so distant past, a farmer was a person who promotes or improves the growth of by labor and attention, land or crops or raises animals.
The International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, is a comprehensive international agreement in harmony with the Convention on Biological Diversity, which aims at guaranteeing food security through the conservation, exchange and sustainable use of the world's plant genetic resources for food and agriculture (PGRFA), the fair and equitable benefit sharing arising from its use, as well as the recognition of farmers' rights. It was signed in 2001 in Madrid, and entered into force on 29 June 2004.
Mercy Corps is a global non-governmental, humanitarian aid organization operating in transitional contexts that have undergone, or have been undergoing, various forms of economic, environmental, social and political instabilities. The organization claims to have assisted more than 220 million people survive humanitarian conflicts, seek improvements in livelihoods, and deliver durable development to their communities. In 2019, senior staff resigned following public disclosure of the organization's longtime inaction over its co-founder's sexual abuse of his daughter.
The International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements is the worldwide umbrella organization for the organic agriculture movement, which represents close to 800 affiliates in 117 countries.
La Vía Campesina is an international farmers organization founded in 1993 in Mons, Belgium, formed by 182 organisations in 81 countries, and describing itself as "an international movement which coordinates peasant organizations of small and middle-scale producers, agricultural workers, rural women, and indigenous communities from Asia, Africa, America, and Europe".
World Food Day is an international day celebrated every year worldwide on 16 October to commemorate the date of the founding of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in 1945. The day is celebrated widely by many other organizations concerned with hunger and food security, including the World Food Programme and the International Fund for Agricultural Development. WFP received the Nobel Prize in Peace for 2020 for their efforts to combat hunger, contribute to peace in conflict areas, and for playing a leading role in stopping the use of hunger in the form of a weapon for war and conflict.
Integrated Farming - UNI 11233-2009 new European agriculture organic standard (IF), integrated production or Integrated Farm Management is a whole farm management system which aims to deliver more sustainable agriculture. It is a dynamic approach which can be applied to any farming system around the world. It involves attention to detail and continuous improvement in all areas of a farming business through informed management processes. Integrated Farming combines the best of modern tools and technologies with traditional practices according to a given site and situation. In simple words, it means using many ways of cultivation in a small space or land.
A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology, involvement of family in labor and economic impact. Smallholdings are usually farms supporting a single family with a mixture of cash crops and subsistence farming. As a country becomes more affluent, smallholdings may not be self-sufficient, but may be value for the rural lifestyle. As the sustainable food and local food movements grow in affluent countries, some of these smallholdings are gaining increased economic viability. There are an estimated 500 million smallholder farms in developing countries of the world alone, supporting almost two billion people.
The history of Agriculture in India dates back to Indus Valley Civilization. India ranks second worldwide in farm outputs. As per 2018, agriculture employed more than 50% of the Indian work force and contributed 17–18% to country's GDP.
Information and communication technology in agriculture, also known as e-agriculture, focuses on the enhancement of agricultural and rural development through improved information and communication processes. More specifically, e-agriculture involves the conceptualization, design, development, evaluation and application of innovative ways to use information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the rural domain, with a primary focus on agriculture. ICT includes devices, networks, mobiles, services and applications; these range from innovative Internet-era technologies and sensors to other pre-existing aids such as fixed telephones, televisions, radios and satellites. Provisions of standards, norms, methodologies, and tools as well as development of individual and institutional capacities, and policy support are all key components of e-agriculture.
The Global Forum on Agricultural Research and Innovation (GFAR) is an inclusive global mechanism enabling all those concerned with the future of agriculture and its role in development around the world to come together and address key global needs. GFAR provides an open forum for stakeholders across the agricultural spectrum—from researchers and organizations to farmers—to participate in collaborative discussion and action around the current and future state of agriculture.
The International Fertilizer Industry Association (IFA) is a nonprofit organization that represents the global fertilizer industry, on issues related to the promotion of plant nutrients, improvement of the operating environment of the member companies and the collection and compilation of industry information.
Soil governance refers to the policies, strategies, and the processes of decision-making employed by nation states and local governments regarding the use of soil. Globally, governance of the soil has been limited to an agricultural perspective due to increased food insecurity from the most populated regions on earth. The Global Soil Partnership, GSP, was initiated by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and its members with the hope to improve governance of the limited soil resources of the planet in order to guarantee healthy and productive soils for a food-secure world, as well as support other essential ecosystem services.
There were 795 million undernourished people in the world in 2014, a decrease of 216 million since 1990, despite the fact that the world already produces enough food to feed everyone—7 billion people—and could feed more than that—12 billion people.
Animal genetic resources for food and agriculture (AnGR) are a subset of genetic resources and a specific element of agricultural biodiversity. The term animal genetic resources refers specifically to the genetic resources of avian and mammalian species, which are used for food and agriculture purposes. Further terms referring to AnGR are "farm animal genetic resources" or "livestock diversity".
Endorsed in December 2017, the United Nations Decade of Family Farming 2019-2028 seeks to place family farming at the center of national public policies and investments. In declaring this decade, the United Nations General Assembly recognized the importance of family farming in reducing poverty and improving global food security. The UN Decade of Family Farming is led by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) in collaboration with governments and civil society organizations.
A number of movements seek to expand the practice of agroecology in West Africa. Agroecology is a scientific discipline, movement and practice that integrates ecology in agriculture with strong emphasis on diversification, food sovereignty, energy efficiency and sustainability. Agroecological practices apply the systems and knowledge that traditional farmers in the region have developed and inherited. The agroecological social movement empowers smallholder farmers that hold the knowledge of indigenous farming systems, however are recently engulfed by larger farms or are migrating to urban areas, looking for better paying jobs.
Sustainable Development Goal 2 aims to achieve "zero hunger". It is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals established by the United Nations in 2015. The official wording is: “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture". SDG 2 highlights the complex inter-linkages between food security, nutrition, rural transformation and sustainable agriculture. According to the United Nations, there are around 690 million people who are hungry, which accounts for 10 percent of the world population. One in every nine people goes to bed hungry each night, including 20 million people currently at risk of famine in South Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Nigeria.
