Agriculture

This edition of The State of Food Insecurity in the World focuses on food price volatility. Our organizations continue to monitor food prices, and have alerted the world through a number of analytical reports on food price trends and ongoing volatility in recent years, as these continue to be a matter of concern for governments and people around the world. Indeed, high and volatile food prices are widely expected to continue in the future.

For a large number of developing countries, agriculture remains the single most important sector. Climate change has the potential to damage irreversibly the natural resource base on which agriculture depends, with grave consequences for food security.

This book is about the conservation of genetic diversity of wild plants in situ in their natural surroundings, primarily in existing protected areas but also outside conventional protected areas. The principles outlined are equally applicable for the in situ genetic conservation of any wild plant species, whether the aim is to maintain a species threatened by habitat fragmentation, over-collection from the wild or a species that has potential use as a gene donor to our crops.

UNDP's Environment and Energy Group is pleased to publish this Report which will be a cornerstone for future approaches and policy dialogue on the economics and management of ecosystem services. The Report highlights the economic contribution of biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services to development and equity in Latin America and the Caribbean. It is to serve as an economic tool for decision makers so that ecosystem services are considered in sectoral and national planning.

This book provides a comprehensive description and assessment of the use of marker-assisted selection for increasing the rate of genetic gain in crops, livestock, forestry and farmed fish, including the related policy, organizational and resource considerations. It continues FAO's tradition of dealing with issues of importance to agricultural and economic development in a multarget_idisciplinary and cross-sectoral manner.

Current trends in fossil-fuel use and inefficient land use will lead to large global environmental problems with respect to climate change and biodiversity loss. Technical and economically feasible options are available to meet the challenge to avoid these problems. The main issue is that of creating institutional and policy conditions for a more sustainable economy.