Within its ongoing efforts to strengthen Tajikistan's agricultural sector, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), has successfully completed a Technical Cooperation Programme Facility project on cooperative development and to strengthen rural institutions under the national Agrarian Reform Programme. The FAO project helped improve the working environment of cooperatives and strengthened the capacity of national authorities to support the development of cooperatives and rural institutions. On a local level, the project supported four agricultural cooperatives.

In 2022, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) began supporting the Ministry of Agriculture of Turkmenistan and its Land Resources Service in modernizing and digitalizing the country’s land cadastre through the technical cooperation project “Support to the establishment of a Digital Land Cadastre”. This project is now concluding. A meeting was held 9 April in Ashgabat to mark the finalization of the project, recap the achievements and look to future actions to continue improving the digital cadastre system.

Living amidst grapevines that have been around since the time of his ancestors, it is no wonder Givi Chubinidze became convinced to follow in their footsteps. Here in the green valleys of Georgia’s Imereti region, bordered by the Likhi mountain range, endemic blue and purple grape varieties, such as tsitska, krakhuna and adanasuri, have been a part of the local landscape and cultural heritage for centuries.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is supporting Turkmenistan’s efforts in enhancing these two priority areas, within the framework of two projects, implemented with the FAO Technical Cooperation Programme (TCP), “Strengthening technological innovation and research capacities for sustainable and climate-resilient cotton production” and “Support for the improvement of pest management capacities for cereal crops”. The implementation of the project started after FAO successfully held a joint inception workshop for the two projects in March, in Ashgabat, bringing together key actors to take initial steps in the work of the projects.

The One Health approach recognizes the interconnections between people and ecosystems and aims to sustainably balance the health of people, plants, animals and the environment. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is strongly committed to this integrated, unifying approach. This was the core message, delivered by FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Europe and Central Asia Viorel Gutu at a high-level meeting of the Regional One Health Coordination Mechanism today in Copenhagen when the chairmanship of the Mechanism was handed over from the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) to FAO, ensuring continued collaboration on One Health priorities in the region.

Inland capture fisheries play a vital role in supporting households, economies and cultures across Europe, through both commercial and recreational fishing. According to capture and landing statistics reported to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the total production from inland capture fisheries in Europe reached 167 187 tonnes in 2021, accounting for 1.5 percent of total global production, making this sector highly important for the region. Yet, climate change poses several challenges to the survival of fish species across Europe. It creates significant and often unpredictable impacts on inland fisheries, and it can be an exacerbating factor for other stressors. Foreseeably, this will lead to shifts in freshwater habitats which are mainly expected to be unfavourable for inland fisheries.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is collaborating with the Scuola Politecnica di Design, the first school for design disciplines in Italy, founded in Milan in 1954. Following an established dialogue, this cooperation aims to offer both online and offline classes focused on FAO's critical role in global food security and the enhancement of quality of life through innovative agrifood systems.

In the Khatlon region of Tajikistan, farming of cotton, wheat and other crops has long been the backbone of rural livelihoods. Safarmad Gadoev, a farmer from the city of Kulob, was one of many who relied on the production of these crops to support his family. But the challenges of cotton and wheat farming—rising production costs, fluctuating market prices, water scarcity, and the impacts of climate change—made it difficult for him to earn a stable income. 

If the people of Europe and Central Asia are to have food on their plates, they must have water security. Moreover, water security is a catalyst for transforming the food and agriculture sectors of the region to become more efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable. Therefore, sustainable water management practices are a prerequisite for farmers’ resilience against climate challenges and, thus, for safeguarding food security. This is the central message of the 2024 Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition report, released today.

A project in Bosnia and Herzegovina, implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in 2022, addressing land degradation neutrality (LDN) issues, is progressing to foster a coherent policy environment and track progress towards achieving the national LDN targets. Land abandonment in the last 25 years has adversely affected 1.2 million rural people.