FAO.org

This is a training course on multisectoral approach to sustainable food and agriculture. It examines the challenges facing agriculture and food production systems and presents a common vision and coordinated approach towards sustainable food and agriculture developed through intensive consultations and discussions among agriculture specialists. It illustrates in detail the five key principles that allow the transition toward a more sustainable and productive agriculture, highlighting examples of strategies, policies and technologies and explaining several sustainability frameworks and programmes which can underpin the efforts towards the implementation of sustainability in food and agriculture.  

FAO has prepared this Programme for Action to help support Sustainable Management of FAW in Africa. FAO works closely with its development and resource partners to maximize coordinated results and minimize duplications.  FAO proposes a five-year programme of action to help farmers, their organizations, their public institutions, national governments and development partners quickly respond the challenges of FAW infestation in smallholder farmers’ fields across Africa.

This report aims to guide FAO – and other international actors – committed to providing developing countries with the support required for implementing their NDCs and ensuring future commitments are transparent, quantifiable, comparable, verifiable and ambitious. The agriculture sectors in Eastern Africa represent a pivotal opportunity for simultaneously leveraging the mitigation potential of the region, while enhancing adaptive capacity and food security outcomes through a transition to more sustainable agriculture and land use. However, change will only come about if supported by appropriate policies, institutional arrangements, capacity development and finance mechanisms. By highlighting the gaps in the coverage of mitigation [...]

This conceptual-level information note seeks to highlight the human rights aspects of the goals and targets relating to food security and small-scale fisheries (SSF), particularly from the perspective of the right to adequate food, and to demonstrate how this interrelationship plays out in the monitoring mechanisms established by relevant instruments. It is the product of a collaborative effort between the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to support, using a human rightsbased approach, the integrated implementation and monitoring of those SDGs that are particularly [...]

Sustainable integrated food energy systems can significantly help to address the huge increase in demands for food, energy and water in the coming years. Therefore, there is need for better information and capacities on how to promote integrated food energy system (IFES) to inform decision-makers and secure policy support to that effect. The project aimed to assess the sustainability and replicability of integrated food-energy systems (IFES, particularly for countries such as Ghana and Mozambique, which face the challenge of producing enough food and energy in a non-competitive way. Find more Project Highlights here.

In March 2017 the Working Group on Nutrition-Sensitive Value Chains of the Rome-based Agencies (FAO, IFAD, WFP and Bioversity International) launched the online consultation How can value chains be shaped to improve nutrition? The consultation was held on the FAO Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition (FSN Forum) from 27 March to 19 April 2017. The aim of this initiative was to engage stakeholders in identifying challenges and opportunities related to nutrition sensitive value chain (NSVC) development. Participants discussed their experiences relating to past or ongoing NSVC experiences on the ground, and were also invited to comment on the discussion paper “Inclusive value chains for sustainable [...]

This study report, developed in collaboration with the Bright Futures of Burkina Faso, is based on the case study in Burkina Faso. It, through a survey of 183 women and 6 men including 36 leaders of shea groups, provides quantitative analysis on the economic resilience derived from shea nuts in terms of income, assets and savings; on the social indicators of wellbeing, education, health and living standards; and on the political implications, especially with regard to women’s decision making at home and at work, participation in the shea value chain and personal aspirations.

This study provides a rationale for building linkages between social protection and sustainable forestry in developing countries through: the development of a conceptual framework for understanding the two-way relationship between social protection instruments and forestry policies; a review of evidence of the role of forestry policies in reducing vulnerabilities and fostering livelihoods among forest-dependent people; a review of the evidence of the impact of social protection instruments on th e resilience of forest-dependent people and on the promotion of sustainable forest management; and a discussion of ways of developing linkages between social protection and forestry policies.

This study reviewed the achievements, and also the shortcomings, of 12 watershed management projects technically supported by FAO over the past decade, with a view to learning from experience. Unlike sectoral development approaches, watershed management involves examining the interactions among various natural processes and land uses and managing land, water and the wider ecosystem of the watershed in an integrated way. Watershed management is best carried out as a stepwise multistakeholder process. The review identified a sequence of steps that watershed management projects or programmes should ideally follow. The approach has demonstrated its effectiveness for responding to global challenges of [...]

A summary of the most significant legislative results achieved on food security and nutrition, school meals, and family farming in Latin America. It includes lessons learned, an overview of mechanisms that have proved useful and an annex with detailed information on 15 regional laws from parliamentary front initiatives. Also available in French and Spanish.