FAO Director-General Graziano da Silva and Marcela Villarreal, Director, Gender, Equity and Rural Employment Division, present FAO's Policy on Gender Equality. The Policy provides FAO with a framework to guide its efforts to achieve gender equality in all its technical work and to assess results.

FAO in collaboration with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and PROCASUR launched an initiative to strengthen women's access to micro financial services. The objective of this activity was also to target practitioners of the rural microfinance industry and assist them with generating effective microfinance programs for both women and men.

Мир не может покончить с голодом, не устранив гендерный разрыв, существующий в сельскохозяйственном секторе. Имея равный доступ к производственным ресурсам и услугам, таким как земля, вода и кредиты, женщины-фермеры могут производить продуктов питания на 20-30 процентов больше, что является достаточным для спасения от голода 150 миллионов человек.

In an effort to raise awareness on the contribution of agricultural cooperatives to food security and poverty alleviation -- FAO, WFP and IFAD -- took part in the official launch of The International Year of Cooperatives (IYC) 2012 at UN headquarters in New York on 31 October 2011.

Most rural women living around the Gulf of Gabes derive their main livelihood from beach clam fishing, so FAO and its partners are actively working to strengthen their role in this fisheries subsector.