The Need for Women and Gender Equality in the Text

By Kimberly Lopez Castellanos Men are predominantly seen as the “head of the household,” right? So wouldn’t a lot of the burden of keeping up with the household fall on them? If this is true, why is it that women are more vulnerable throughout the world? At this moment, women are suffering from inequality because they are the ones that provide stability and security not only for themselves...

Lessons from Language: CFS41 in Hindsight

by Khristian Méndez // Two weeks ago, Chairperson Gerda Verburg was wrapping up CFS41 in a room that had perhaps a third of the people who were there on opening day. An exhausting experience, this plenary session of the CFS planted several ideas in me about language. If you like numbers, ghosts, or interpretation, keep reading. Numerical Language Days of negotiations: 8.  Average number of...

Sustainability: A First World Problem

Due to my old-school version of note taking---by hand and chronologically, in a little notebook---I unfortunately cannot recall the full context in which session staffer Stephanie Hanson of the One Acre Fund talked about sustainability, but I’ll give it the good old college try.  Ms. Hanson stated that the question of sustainability – with regard to agricultural development in developing...

Nothing about us, without us / The 5th Annual CSO Forum

by Clara Mareschal & Khristian Méndez // We are at work. Civil Society Organizations from around the world are gathered once more at the FAO Headquarters in Rome, Italy, to prepare in advance their coordinated visions on the political architecture needed to guarantee food security and nutrition for all. This is the 5th Annual Civil Society Forum of the International Civil Society Mechanism...

Finding [a][our] Voice?

 By Pablo Aguilera Del Castillo FAO, Rome Day One  Morning 6:30 am. I wake up and get ready for the first day at the conference with the other people in the civil society group, also called the Civil Society Mechanism for the CSF or the Committee on World Food Security. I start revising the background documents with a cappuccino in hand as I wait for the rest of the delegation to come to the...