The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced plans to join forces with the Government of Brazil in organizing an international conference to review agrarian reform and rural development issues worldwide next March.
Focusing on sustainable rural development options that can contribute to cutting rural poverty and hunger, the four-day meeting will be held in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Three out of every four people suffering from hunger live in rural areas and depend on natural resources such as land and water for their survival, according to FAO. But most of them – especially women and indigenous populations – do not have secure and continued access to either.
"If we want to reduce hunger and poverty in the world, we must go to the root causes of the problem" said Parviz Koohafkan, who will serve as Executive Secretary of the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development.
"And in the poor rural zones, one of the main problems is the lack of secure access to factors of production, particularly land and water."
