Slovenia has become the latest country to join the European Inland Fisheries and Aquaculture Advisory Commission. Mateja Čalušić, Slovenia’s Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Food, submitted a letter to QU Dongyu, the Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), on 18 January 2024, expressing Slovenia’s wish to join EIFAAC.

For International Women’s Day, the perspectives of three remarkable women, are in the spotlight: an entrepreneur and community organizer from rural Albania, a distinguished academic from Türkiye, and a forward-thinking policy-maker from Uzbekistan.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), which had been supporting the cooperative even before the earthquake, stepped in to help the collective get back on its feet. By providing machinery and equipment, FAO ensured that women-led cooperatives received the help they needed to rebuild and recover. Such initiatives align with FAO's commitment to invest in gender equality and women’s empowerment in agrifood systems. These go a long way in advancing progress and enhancing the resilience and food security of households and communities.

Approximately ten percent of the Tajikistan’s population is working abroad. This income-driven migration has serious socioeconomic impacts such as divorce, labour shortages in agriculture, legal and financial issues, and increased hardships for rural women’s livelihoods. A joint Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), International Organization for Migration (IOM), UN Women and UNICEF project, “Empowerment of Abandoned Families for Improved Migration Outcomes in Khatlon”, tackled multiple issues faced by rural women and families made vulnerable by outmigration of family members. 

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in partnership with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Committee of Veterinary and Livestock Development of the Republic of Uzbekistan have launched a new project, implemented by the FAO Emergency Centre for Transboundary Animal Diseases (ECTAD), under USAID’s Global Health Security program. The project will support Uzbekistan’s ability to prevent, detect and respond to animal and public health threats. The inception workshop of the FAO ECTAD project brought together representatives in the agriculture, veterinary, and livestock sectors from the Government of Uzbekistan, international organizations, national research institutes, and civil society.

More than 400 participants gathered last week in Antalya, Türkiye with the common goal to scale up science for effective fisheries management at the second edition of the Forum on Fisheries Science in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea (Fish Forum 2024). The event, organized by the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), is the most important scientific gathering dedicated to fisheries and related issues in the region.

The Europe and Central Asia region has a wide variety of topography and climates and is vulnerable to climate change. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has been partnering with the Global Environment Facility (GEF) for over two decades to support countries in sustainably managing natural resources and preserving biodiversity in a changing climate and to ensure food security and nutrition while reversing environmental degradation and its impacts.

The Republic of Moldova's table grape sector is set to gain new opportunities thanks to its inclusion in the "One Country One Priority Product" (OCOP) initiative, led globally by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). A pivotal technical assistance agreement, valued at USD 350 000 for two years, was formalized at the start of this week between the FAO Representative in the Republic of Moldova, Raimund Jehle, and the Deputy Prime-minister and Minister of Agriculture and Food Industry (MAFI), Vladimir Bolea.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) welcomed an additional $3 million contribution from PhosAgro, Russia's leading phosphate-based fertilizer producer, to support the efforts of the Global Soil Partnership (GSP) to help more farmers implement soil-improving management measures and boost the capacities of national soil laboratories in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, Latin America, and the Near East.

The Republic of Moldova is at high risk of drought and extreme weather events, two challenges exacerbated by climate change. Family farmers and others in the agriculture sector are the most vulnerable to the impacts of these extreme events. The severe drought in 2022, for example, was devastating for smallholder farmers. In 2023, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) distributed 30 tonnes of seeds and 60 tonnes of fertilizer to 1 224 small farmers in the Calarasi, Rascani and Cantemir districts.