The Story of the FAO Library – 65th Anniversary 1952–2017 is a journey through the events that led to what has become one of the world’s finest collections of materials (both digital and print) on food, agriculture and international development. Today, the library is the depository of over one and a half million volumes, plus a collection of 400 rare books, 32 incunabula (books printed before 1501) and thousands of digital publications. Its origins lie in the International Institute of Agriculture (IIA), founded in Rome in 1905 by King Vittorio Emanuele III to defend and modernize agriculture, with the encouragement of David Lubin, an American citizen and passionate promoter of agricultural knowledge. Lubin committed to creating and developing the Institute’s library, soon the reference point for research centres, governments and other agencies specialized in agricultural matters. In the aftermath of World War II, the legacy of the IIA and its unique library were closely safeguarded by FAO. FAO’s library, which officially opened in 1952, was named after Lubin “in recognition of the foresight, leadership, and outstanding contribution … to international co-operation in the field of agriculture.” This publication unveils the library’s precious collections, ranging from those inherited from the Marquise Raffaele Cappelli, second President of the IIA, to the atlases, periodicals, yearbooks and even an edition of Alexander von Humboldt's Cosmos from the Centre International de Sylviculture collection. The publication's text is accompanied by photographs and images taken from the archives, showing rare pieces ranging from the incunabula to exquisite hand-drawn illustrations. And what about today? Already as of the 1970s, the library had embarked on digitalization, providing access to technologies and supporting libraries in some 90 developing countries via FAO's decentralized offices. As the book reveals, the Library continues to rise to the digital challenge, maintaining its pivotal role in knowledge dissemination.

This book tells the story of the David Lubin Memorial Library, one of the richest collections of volumes in the world on food, agriculture and international development. It includes archival images, ranging from rare incunabula to exquisite hand-drawn illustrations.

This illustrated volume identifies the challenges and opportunities facing food and agriculture in the context of the 2030 Agenda, presents solutions for a more sustainable world and shows how FAO has been working in recent years to support its Member Nations in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

At the United Nations Conference of 1943, in Hot Springs, Virginia, a specific plan was drawn up for the establishment of a permanent organization in the field of food and agriculture. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) was founded a few years later, on 16 October 1945 in Quebec City, in Canada, and then temporarily established in Washington, D.C., in the United States of America. On 29 November 1949, the FAO General Conference established that the new permanent headquarters would be located in Rome, Italy. Today, around 11 000 people work for FAO, from almost all of the 194 Member Nations. They include agronomists, ichthyologists, and experts in food security and forestry, as well as in politics, law, economics and social development. This purpose of this book is to recount the Organization’s history, its mission and its day-to-day work in achieving its mandate: to eradicate hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition worldwide; eliminate rural poverty; promote the sustainable use of natural resources and encourage the development of more efficient and inclusive agricultural and food systems, through the definition of agreements and standards.

A definitive history of ideas about land redistribution, allied political movements, and their varied consequences around the world "An epic work of breathtaking scope and moral power, The Long Land War offers the definitive account of the rise and fall of land rights around the world over the last 150 years."--Matthew Desmond, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City Jo Guldi tells the story of a global struggle to bring food, water, and shelter to all. Land is shown to be a central motor of politics in the twentieth century: the basis of movements for giving reparations to formerly colonized people, protests to limit the rent paid by urban tenants, intellectual battles among development analysts, and the capture of land by squatters taking matters into their own hands. The book describes the results of state-engineered "land reform" policies beginning in Ireland in 1881 until U.S.-led interests and the World Bank effectively killed them off in 1974. The Long Land War provides a definitive narrative of land redistribution alongside an unflinching critique of its failures, set against the background of the rise and fall of nationalism, communism, internationalism, information technology, and free-market economics. In considering how we could make the earth livable for all, she works out the important relationship between property ownership and justice on a changing planet.

This book showcases the archeology, history and works of art of FAO’s headquarters in Rome, through spectacular photographs and informative texts, and reveals the places where world leaders and worldwide experts meet to fight world hunger.

This publication marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of FAO as a United Nations Agency for Food and Agriculture. This book tells the story of these seven decades of the history of FAO, its protagonists and their endeavours. This is the history in seven decades of an organisation born with one goal: to free humanity of hunger.