World Food Day - 16 October

The theme of the World Food Day 2015 will be “Social protection and Agriculture."

 As in the case every year, the World Food Day will take place on October 16th , whose main goal is to raise public awareness about hunger challenges and encourage people worldwide to take action in the fight against hunger.  

The topic for 2015 will be “Social protection and Agriculture”, which aims to underline the role social protection plays in reducing chronic food insecurity and poverty by ensuring direct access to food or the means to buy food.  Social protection is, moreover, a viable alternative for stimulating agricultural production and local economic activity. 

WFO is particularly pleased with the choice of topic, which reflects a clear intention to highlight important agriculture- related issues, drawing attention to achievements in rural development and encouraging agricultural food production.

In this context, the role played by the farmers is crucial. Farmers are of the key actors in the process of fighting hunger and finding concrete remedies that address issues affecting food security and nutrition. 

The next WFO General Assembly will have a specific session dedicated to how to provided the growing world population with sustainable, equitable and inclusive solutions in the agricultural sector. Farmers, in fact, have the task of producing quality safe food in order to achieve the goal of food security for everyone. As FAO has stated, agricultural production must increase by 60% globally to meet the food demand that will be required to feed the 9.2 billion people who will inhabit our planet in 2050. 

In order to guarantee this result and face this challenge, it is crucial to ensure that farmers have access to infrastructures, credit and functioning markets. Farmers also need to have access to science, innovation and knowledge, which are essential for the development of the agricultural sector.

“As a farmer, I must know what food provide proper nutrition to human beings and women should be aware of what we produce and what are the specific characteristics thereof”, WFO Acting President Evelyn Nguleka stated in a recent interview. “I think technology and innovation should work together to produce the quality food that we need to survive.”

WFO is looking forward to the next World Food Day as another great chance to highlight the vital role of farmers in feeding the planet and producing energy for life. In light of the fact that  the next World Food Day will be celebrated by the UN at the Milan EXPO 2015, its slogan is definitely the clearest way of defining  the global role that farmers, leaving aside October 16th, play on every other day of the year.