October 16th is World Food Day, celebrating the anniversary of the foundation in 1945 of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The purpose of the day is to focus on problems such as malnutrition and access to food, that continue to afflict large parts of the world’s population.

 

In a recently published report entitled "State of Food Insecurity 2009", the FAO estimated an increase of 9% in the number of “hungry people”. This increase, that will bring the total to the alarming number of a billion malnourished individuals, is also due in part to the international economic crisis in progress. On the other hand, however, if we look at the data relative to the last decade, we can see that the total has been slowly but steadily increasing all along. This is an indication, according to the general director of the Fao Jacques Diouf, that the extreme weakness of the world’s system of food security governance is a constant factor irrespective of economic cycles.

 

For more information:

http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/36207/icode/