World Food Day: Getting to Zero
World Food Day was adopted in 1981 to mark the birthday of the birth of the Food and Agricluture (FAO) Organization on October 16, 1945. This year’s World Food Day theme is “Agricultural cooperatives – key to feeding the world.” The theme of cooperatives was selected in order to “highlight the role of cooperatives in improving food security and contributing to the eradication of hunger,” said the FAO.
Hunger continues to be a significant problem around the world. FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva stressed that point in his remarks at the UN’s World Food Day Ceremony. “Nearly 870 million men, women and children still go hungry every day. In Africa and in the Near East the number of undernourished people is still growing,” he said. “We cannot allow that in a world of plenty. We already produce enough food for every human being.”
The FAO is working with other UN bodies and partners like the World Food Programme (WFP) to achieve the goal of no hunger. It guilds on the Zero Hunger Challenge launched by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the Rio +20 conference. The challenge outlines the bold goal to realize a future with no hunger, no child stunting thorough a 100% increase in sustainable food production and small farmer productivity.
WFP launched a campaign recently that features a young girl named Molly. She lives in Kenya’s Mathare slum and takes viewers on a tour of her home and friends. The audience gets to see her family, where she goes to school and learn how WFP programs impact her life.
Watch a special message from Molly to mark World Food Day:October 16, 2012