Conference "Who will feed the world? Towards diverse, sustainable forms of agriculture as drivers of development"

• On: 03.07.2008
• In: Brussels

By 2050, the world's population will have reached 9 billion. To cope with demographic growth and the consequent increase in food demand, agriculture must double its production in the next 30 years

To meet the challenge, all agriculture forms in countries of both the North and the South will need to be involved and developed. Yet these developments will only be sustainable if a number of environmental challenges are also addressed: climate change, desertification, land degradation, depletion of water resources, etc. Since most impoverished population groups live off subsistence farming, peasant farming is a necessary condition to achieving the Millennium Development Goals, aimed at halving the world's population living in extreme poverty and suffering from chronic hunger by 2015. Moreover, fluctuating food prices and the non-food uses of agricultural products are changing the conditions of development of agricultural practices. Agriculture is therefore a major issue on the international scene and has regained a genuinely central role in growth and development.

In this context, the conference aims to present the challenges ahead for global food security and the world's various agriculture forms, and to discuss the ways in which they can overcome through the involvement of stakeholders, producers, private sector operators, politicians and researchers on national, regional and global levels. It also seeks to clarify the role of agriculture in development policies which aim to alleviate poverty, drive growth and improve management of the environment.

• Updated: 17.12.2008

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