In May, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and the World Bank announced that they are strengthening their cooperative efforts to end global poverty and hunger. The two organizations are working together in supporting the governments of underdeveloped nations as they work to meet their Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The U.N. was founded in 1945 and is comprised of 193 countries around the world, all working to secure peace, end global poverty and hunger, and eliminate terrorism, among other objectives. The World Bank, meanwhile, is an organization with 10,000 employees that provides low-interest loans, credit and grants to developing countries for ventures such as agriculture.

Together, these two groups are working more closely to make sure that the SDGs set by the U.N. are accomplished by 2030. There are 17 goals listed on the U.N.’s website, including the end of global poverty and hunger, quality education and decent work and economic growth, to name a few.

In order to meet these goals by 2030, a framework agreement was signed in Rome on May 10 by Daniel Gustafson, FAO Deputy Director-General, and Hartwig Schafer, Vice President of Operations Policy and Country Services for the World Bank.

Both Gustafson and Schafer agreed that signing this agreement would speed up their goals and help both the U.N. and the World Bank work more efficiently together to end global poverty and hunger. Schafer stated that signing the agreement is an important step in strengthening the organizations’ joint commitment to making project-level assistance faster and more efficient.

The very same day the agreement was signed in Rome, The Ghana News Agency reported a workshop was taking place, organized by the FAO and attended by members of the Coalition for African Rice Development. The workshop afforded members the opportunity to share information on improved rice production practices.

Abebe Haile-Gabriel, the FAO Deputy Regional Representative for Africa, stated that the FAO’s newest operation is an important mechanism for the achievement of their strategic framework.

With the signing of the new agreement and the already-evident action being taken, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development should be on track to reach its goal, and ending global poverty will soon be less of an idea and more of a reality.

– Vicente Vera

Photo: Flickr