Transforming mountain awareness into action

As the International Year of Mountains comes to a close, FAO, as lead agency for the Year, looks ahead to actions that will strengthen the ability of countries to lead the sustainable development of their mountain regions.

Milk Vita: right formula for grassroots success

A self-sustaining dairy cooperative in Bangladesh has raised incomes, improved nutrition and allowed 40 000 families to plan for a more hopeful future.

A harvest of silence

Efforts to boost the economy of one of Guatemala's poorest regions through cash cropping threatens the cultural and genetic diversity of the Maya.

What is the right to food?

Debate on the right to food is likely to be lively at the World Food Summit: five years later.

Banking for the poor

Microcredit alone may not be enough. The poor need access to financial services.

AIDS hitting African farm sector hard

Latest statistics show over half of those with HIV/AIDS live in rural areas, where stricken families struggle to produce enough food to survive.

Foetal hunger can mean adult ill-health

Recent research shows that chronic adult diseases like hypertension and obesity are linked to undernourishment before birth.

Feeding an increasingly urban world

By 2005, over half the world's people will live in cities. Supplying them with safe and affordable food will strain the food supply and distribution chain to the breaking point. The challenge is greatest in the developing world's cities.

The salt of the earth: hazardous for food production

Irrigation produces much of the world's food, but about a tenth of the world's irrigated land has been damaged by salt. This has become a profound threat to food security.

The developing world's new burden: obesity

For the first time, the number of overweight individuals worldwide rivals the number of underweight. And many of them are found in developing nations. Obesity in poor nations is growing -- in some cases reaching the same levels as the industrialized world. Obesity carries a greater risk of chronic illness including diabetes, heart disease and cancer. It also often masks underlying deficiencies in vitamins and minerals. For countries whose resources are already stretched to the limit, confronting this new problem poses a serious challenge.