Invitation: World Food Day seminar organized on 29th October - topics food security, social protection and living soils - welcome!

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations FAO:s World food Day theme for this year is Social Protection and Agriculture - Breaking the Cycle of Rural Poverty. This year we also celebrate the International Year of Soils.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations FAO:s World food Day theme for this year is Social Protection and Agriculture - Breaking the Cycle of Rural Poverty. This year we also celebrate the International Year of Soils.

The Finnish National FAO Committee and the University of Helsinki organize a World Food Day seminar in University of Helsinki Main Building (Fabianinkatu 33, room 12) on Thursday October 29th at 11:30-14:00. Participation is free of charge. Seminar is chaired by the chair of the Finnish FAO committee Aulikki Hulmi.

On the World Food Day seminar experts from different fields clarify the role of social protection and healthy soils in developing countries. In recent years, around 150 million people have overcome extreme poverty thanks to social protection programmes. Still today, some 70 percent of the world population, most of which live in rural areas, have no access to adequate social protection measures. A majority of people without social protection live in the rural areas of developing countries, many of them dependent on agriculture to make a living. Poor rural households are already constrained by limited access to resources, low agricultural productivity and poorly functioning markets, which reduce their ability to cope with economic and natural risks and shocks that threaten their livelihoods. Social Protection helps tackle vulnerabilities faced by rural households and plays a fundamental role in improving food and nutrition security and reducing rural poverty.

On the World Food Day we also observe the role of the soil for achieving food security. The soil processes are important for the productivity of the soil, and thereby also for food production. For the sake of the world’s food security we have to take better care of our soils.

Registration by October 21st through here.

Welcome to listen to social protection impacts on food security and the important role of healthy soils!

The World Food Day Seminar Programme on 29th October

11.30 Coffee in the 3rd floor lounge
12.15 The Minister of Agriculture and the Environment of Finland Kimmo Tiilikainen: opening speech
12:30 Research Fellow Miguel Niño-Zarazúa (UNU-WIDER): Social transfers against malnutrition: what do we know about their effectiveness?
13:00 Professor Juha Helenius (University of Helsinki): Feeding soil, feeding people: ecologically integrated paradigm for sustainable food systems
13:25 Adjunct Professor Markus Kröger (University of Helsinki): Food sovereignty and agrarian reform as social protection
13:50 Summary and closing of the seminar