Fao In Latin America And The Caribbean 2021

In this report, FAO illustrates the progress in fulfilling the mandate given to us by the Member Countries during 2021. In 2021, Latin American and Caribbean countries proved that even during one of the most demanding periods in recent history, it is possible to drive better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life, leaving no one behind. The results included in this document are important, but partial, examples of our work.

In recent years, various factors have diverted the world off the path to eradicating hunger, food insecurity and all forms of malnutrition by 2030, and the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated this trend. Latin America and the Caribbean is no exception. This edition of the Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition 2021: Statistics and Trends reveals a bleak scenario for the future. In 2020, 59.7 million people in the region suffered from hunger, and between 2019 and 2020 the prevalence of hunger in Latin America and the Caribbean increased by 2 percentage points. Much of this can be explained by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which reduced the incomes of millions of people in the region. But it is not behind all the setbacks, as the region's hunger figures have been growing for six consecutive years.

The book has been prepared by authors from different international organizations – including FAO, IFPRI, UNCTAD and ECLAC, as well as legislators and academics from prestigious Latin American universities – seeking to foster reflections for the Global Food Systems Summit, to be held in September 2021. It contextualizes the region’s food systems within a post COVID-19 pandemic scenario and raises new challenges (and opportunities) for policy makers, decision makers, the private sector, and the general public. Likewise, it offers important reflections on sustainability, from production to consumption, with the call to promote better governance of the global and regional food system. In order to face what some authors have deemed “the Syndemic of the century”, the participation of companies, research centres, academia, NGOs, government agencies and international organizations will be necessary.

On 23 September 2021, the Food Systems Summit convened by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, was held. Latin America and the Caribbean played an essential role in this event. The official proposals and recommendations presented at the Summit are part of the official reports of the national dialogues and the speeches of their official representatives. In this publication, we reproduce the transcripts of these 23 speeches. This publication is an invitation to those who want to learn about Latin America and the Caribbean proposals at the Summit.

The Gender Strategy proposes to deepen the analysis of the initiatives that achieve changes and - structural transformations - of the unequal relations, emphasizing in the monitoring of the SDGs and the indicators under the mandate of the FAO. Furthermore, the strategy must respond to the challenges of the current context, some of which are in the order of the slowdown in economic growth, the increase in poverty and hunger, demographic changes and in the composition and structure of families and the exhaustion of the current development model, characterized by the increase of inequalities and environmental crises.

The objective of the publication is to provide a regional overview and show the joint efforts of FAO and the World Food Program in supporting the School Feeding Programs (SFPs) in Latin America and the Caribbean. Likewise, the document focuses on the main strategic areas of joint work, within the framework of the common vision of the SFPs as a public policy instrument to achieve the goals of sustainable development by 2030. Finally, this document presents three case studies from countries where FAO and WFP work together in support of SFPs: Dominican Republic, Colombia and Honduras.

This evaluation had the purpose of assessing the performance and added value of the FAO Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean (RLC), taking into account the role of the regional initiatives as mechanisms to facilitate such work. It was found that the support provided, especially for the escalation of results, has been substantive and useful, however, there is no institutional strategy that promotes the identification of factors that promote upscaling of programmes based on organizational learning. Recommendations were drawn up to improve the relevance of the work around the regional initiatives, as well as to promote the scaling up of programmes, the implementation of policies for the inclusion of gender perspectives and of indigenous, Afrodescendant and tribal peoples, the generation and use of evidence as a basis for decision-making, and to address the new context derived from COVID-19.