Today is World Food Day. What a better day than this to start writing about nutrition, health, food policies, and anything that revolves around food!!
World Food Day was established by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) members in 1979. The first one was held in 1981 and, since then, it is celebrated each year on 16 October, the day on which the Organization was founded in 1945.
Some of the objectives of World Food Day are to raise awareness about sustainable food systems and nutrition, draw attention about malnutrition, hunger and poverty in the world.
The 2014 World Food Day theme is “Family Farming: Feeding the world, caring for the earth”. The theme was chosen to emphasize the important role played by family farming in eradicating hunger and poverty.
To underline the importance of family farms, the UN General Assembly has designated 2014 THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF FAMILY FARMING.
Family farming includes all family-based agricultural activities and both, in developing and developed countries, it family farming is the predominant form of agriculture in the food production sector.
To better understand this, let’s take a look at some figures *:
• 500 million out of the 570 million farms in the world are family farms.
• They make up over 98% of farming holdings
• They are responsible for at least 56% of agricultural production on 56% of the land
Family farms are fruit and vegetable farms, grain farms, orchards, livestock ranches, and even fisheries and those that harvest non-wood forest products.
Family farmers grow our food and take care of the land for future generations, a good reason to give our support to family farmers this World Food Day!
Below you can find some links where you can find more info about World Food Day and how to support family farming!!!
Happy World Food Day!!!
http://www.fao.org/world-food-day/home/en/
http://www.fao.org/family-farming-2014/home/what-is-family-farming/en/
*data provided by the FAO, based on Census data
Mindful Nutrition, LLC 