FAO will be present in force at the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro including at a high-level discussion on food security and the environment on 21 June attended by the UN Secretary-General, heads of state and government and senior UN officials. FAO experts and high level officials will also cover all sectors of the Rio debate: food, oceans, energy, jobs, water, cities and disasters. FAO's message to the Rio process is that without the eradication of hunger there can be no sustainable development. And since food production will have to increase by 60 percent by 2050 to feed a projected 9 billion people, we can expect agriculture to continue to drive sustainable development.
FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva, together with ministers of environment or agriculture, and technical experts from FAO and the other Rome-based agencies will be present at a series of high-level events in Rio. Journalists are welcome to attend and may phone the contacts listed above to arrange interviews.
For the Rio+20 conference, FAO has produced three major documents:
- a policy paper http://www.fao.org/docrep/015/an894e/an894e00.pdf
- a report on energy-smart food systems http://www.fao.org/docrep/015/an913e/an913e.pdf
- a study on reducing food waste http://www.fao.org/docrep/014/mb060e/mb060e00.pdf
The UN food organization has also just released a dossier profiling its work towards hunger eradication, consisting of success stories and examples from the field that show how FAO is collaborating with countries and other partners to alleviate hunger, improve nutrition, strengthen agricultural economies and rural communities, and safeguard the natural resources upon which food production depends. The dossier covers the full range of FAO's activities, from helping ex-combatants in the Congo turn from fighting to fishing, to networking globally to improve information on food markets, to helping countries of the Nile better manage their scant water resources, plus more.
Learn more: FAO Impact - Turning knowledge into action
FAO AT RIO+20: KEY EVENTS:
Agriculture and Rural Development Day
18 June 2012; time 8-18.00
Sulamerica Convention Center
Forests: the heart of a green economy
18 June 2012, time t
Ribalta venue
Aiming for a Food Secure Future
FAO, IFAD, WFP, Bioversity International
19 June 2012, time 9:00-18:30
Sheraton Hotel, Leblon
Partnerships for the integration of food and nutrition security, health and gender equality
Public Health Institute, WFP, FAO, WHO, UNDP
20 June 2012, time 16:30-18:00
Riocentro Room:T-3
Goals for Healthy Soils and the Role of the Global Soil Partnership
FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva and six ministers of agriculture, from Bhutan, Brazil, Chile, Korea, South Africa and Uruguay will participate.
20 June, 19:00-20:30
Riocentro Room: P3-B
2nd High Level Round Table meeting of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA)
Ministry of Agriculture-Brazil, Ministry of Foreign Affairs-Brazil, Ministry of Agriculture-Italy, Min. of Agriculture-Norway, FAO, AD HOC Committee on the Funding Strategy of the International Treaty
21 June 2012, time 11:00-12:30
Riocentro Room: P3-F
