The benefits and use of agroecological farming are to be discussed at the upcoming International Symposium on Agroecology for Food and Nutrition Security.

Among the speakers are Ravi Prabhu, Deputy Director General – Research and Edmundo Barrios, Senior Scientist in Land and Soil Management, from the World Agroforestry Centre. They will be joining agroecology experts from around the world in debating how agroecological initiatives can “increase and improve provision of goods and services from agriculture, forestry, and fisheries in a sustainable manner.”

An article on the Food Tank website explains how current approaches to food production - high input, resource intensive, monoculture cropping – is failing us. Nearly 1 billion people are hungry, 1.5 billion people are overweight or obese, half of our topsoil has been lost over the past 150 years and biodiversity is disappearing fast.

“We need better, holistic, more agroecological and environmentally-smart agricultural practices to nourish the planet,” says the article. It gives examples of how farmers across the globe are using agroecological methods, such as agroforestry and crop diversification, to produce more food, become resistant to pests and diseases, and protect the environment.

According to the former UN Special Rapporteur Olivier De Schutter, “scaling up agroecological practices can simultaneously increase farm productivity and food security, improve incomes and rural livelihoods, and reverse the trend towards species loss and genetic erosion.”

The symposium is being hosted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) from 18-19 September 2014 in Rome, Italy.

Read the full story: Scaling Up Agroecological Solutions, Farmer to Farmer

For more information on the symposium, visit: http://www.fao.org/about/meetings/afns/en/