Friday, October 19 2018 15:33

ArmInfo. Despite the availability of food, 9.6% of children under five are undernourished in Armenia. On this October 19 at a press conference in Yerevan,  timed to coincide with World Food Day, celebrated in the world on  October 16, said the Armenian representative of the Food and  Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN Raymond Yale.

 According to him, it is necessary to develop a state policy in this direction. He  acknowledged that the number of undernourished children in Armenia is  decreasing from year to year, but, nevertheless, the problem must be  solved. He pointed out the importance of continuing and expanding the  school feeding program, which is being financed by the Russian  Federation and with the assistance of the Food and Agriculture  Organization of the United Nations. An important component of the  state policy should be to reduce losses in the field of agriculture,  as well as providing assistance to small farms, which will lead to a  fivefold reduction of poverty in rural areas and twice increase  agricultural production. A special place should be given to the  involvement in agriculture of women, who constitute 43% of the total  rural population. In this case, the representative of FAO continued,  the number of poor people in rural areas in Armenia will decrease by  22% -30%.  To note, every year on October 16, the world celebrates  World Food Day, established by the United Nations in 1945. According  to the goals of the UN, it is planned to reach zero hunger by 2030.  However, since 2015, there has been a trend of growing hunger, which  affects every ninth inhabitant of the planet, or 821 million people.