It is World Food Day and the FAO is calling on people from various sectors and professions worldwide to join forces and commit to achieving Zero Hunger. This means working together to ensure everyone, everywhere, has access to the safe, healthy and nutritious food they need.

According to the latest Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) 2018 State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report, over 820 million people are chronically undernourished. Around 70 percent of the world's poor live in rural areas where people’s lives depend on agriculture, fisheries or forestry.

With a growing population expected to reach 9 billion in 2050, farmers should find new, more productive ways to farm food and diversify their crops. The FAO says using an integrated farming approach will not only help farmers increase their crops’ yield, and thus their profits, but can also improve the quality of their farmland.

The FAO is urging smallholder farmers to adopt new, sustainable agricultural methods to increase productivity and income. They say ensuring the resilience of rural communities requires an approach that is mindful of the environment that leverages the power of technological innovation and creates stable and rewarding employment opportunities.

The FAO has called on governments to create opportunities for greater private sector investments in agriculture, while boosting social protection programmes for the vulnerable and linking food producers with urban areas.

As part of our work towards achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2, GODAN and The Open Data Charter have launched the Open Up Guide for Agriculture to help governments to prioritize and publish relevant datasets for agricultural development. The guide is for governments that want to start developing an open data strategy for agricultural transformation. It provides guidance on: why it is important that governments open agricultural data, what data is needed to catalyze sustainable agricultural production and how to create and implement an open data strategy. 

For more information visit the new Open Up Guide for Agriculture website.