Talk:Food and Agriculture Organization

Page move

It was requested (and voted against) for Food and Agriculture Organization to be moved to FAO - this is the discussion:

The organization is probably better known by its acronym. Most wikilinks point to FAO, which is a redirect. I propose moving the article there. Jonathunder 00:35, 2005 Mar 1 (UTC)

• Oppose as a colossal waste of time. Acronyms redirect to the full name of the organization. After the RM, SS → Schutzstaffel, currently however... CIA → Central Intelligence Agency, WTO → World Trade Organization, USOC → United States Olympic Committee, EU to European Union et cetera ad infinitum. As the FAO is a UN organization, it should be noted that articles regarding United Nations organizations are usually in full name with acronyms established as redirects: UN → United Nations, UNESCO → United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNICEF → United Nations Children's Fund, WHO → World Health Organization, etc. It would probably be a disambiguation mess if every organization were listed at their acronyms. Why then would it be logical—in the face of every other alphabet soup organization redirecting to the corresponding full name—to make the FAO any different? —ExplorerCDT 01:06, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • P.S. If you deign to think it important enough to warrant wasting our time with such nonsense, I would advise that your time would be better spent finding all the wikilinks that point to FAO and change them appropriately. —ExplorerCDT 01:06, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Oppose. Neutrality^talk 01:39, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
• Oppose. It seems to be a general and good policy that abbreviations are not the titles of articles, particularly when I'm always suprised by what different things three letters can mean to different people with different backgrounds. Gareth Hughes 17:20, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)
• Oppose. -- Necrothesp 18:09, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Not moved. violet/riga (t) 23:14, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

coins

I have seen a few of these FAO coins from different countries. What is their purpose?? --Astrokey44 15:11, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's a page with some quickie info on the coins, [1]. We really should mention them in the article. It's sort of a quirky sideline, but it has taken off...Lisamh 01:29, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

merge applications into Food and Agriculture Organization article

I suggest we merge World Agricultural Trade Matrix, World Agricultural Trade Flow, and FAOSTAT into the Food and Agriculture Organization article. There's really not much to say about them individually for an encyclopedia entry. (Although the FAO statistics office and its products are fabulous resources for users of that sort of data.) This would give us one nice strong article, rather than several sparse interlinked ones. Lisamh 01:17, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

I would agree with a compromise as follows: merge World Agricultural Trade Matrix and World Agricultural Trade Flow into FAOSTAT, but keep Food and Agriculture Organization as a seperate article. Why? because WATM and WATF are services under the FAO Stats Division, but do not justify more than a passing mention in the FAO article. Sure, the FAO article needs expanding, and I might give it a try (I used to work for them), but it should be expanded by providing a comprehensive summary of the work of all Divisions rather than a lot of attention to FAOSTAT. APB-CMX 11:35, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

The above suggestion has been carried out. There are now two articles: 1. Food and Agriculture Organization which consists of a general description of the organisation, greatly expanded in recent weeks, and 2. FAOSTAT, that includes info about FAOSTAT, WATM and WATF. What was missing until today was a link between the FAO and FAOSTAT articles. This has now been added and - as a result - I have removed the merge tag from the article. APB-CMX 05:55, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

POV Section

There are large chunks of unreferenced text in this article. It sounds like it came straight out of the FAO Press Room. On 13th Nov, the article was tagged in three places with citation needed. On 14th Nov, the tags were removed and the unreferenced material was put under the heading What FAO says about itself. It is my opinion that this latest edit does NOT solve the problem of making unreferenced claims about the value of the organisation's work. If this is really what FAO says about itself, then the sources should be mentioned. It can't be too difficult - surely - to create some links to relevant documents kept on the FAO website? Until sources are cited (as they are in the Criticism section) the POV tag should be used for the Programmes and Achievements section. APB-CMX 15:55, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the article as a whole is FAO's point of view about itself. Yes, each part should be specifically referenced and should be balanced with non-FAO viewpoints. A seperate section with non-FAO POV is a beginning, but much more should be added and then merged with FAO's point of view to create balanced article. But that's a lot of work and we'll probably only get there slowly. WAS 4.250 22:37, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

FAO report on Agricultural Biotechnology. It seems that the FAO Press Room is not content with writing most of the article, they also want to edit the section of 'criticism'. I would like to defend the reversion WAS 4.250 and note that the subsequent 're-insertion' by User:ANFO left the section in a mess, with duplicate sentences and a meaningless subtitle. I have now reverted same as WAS 4.250. The current description of the report on biotechnology consists of: a) a link to the document, b) a single reference for the criticism, and b) a single reference for the FAO response. I believe this is fair and balanced, unlike the text inserted by User:ANFO which adds another 4 references to defend the report. I can easily find another 4 references condeming the report, but I don't believe that would be a constructive way to proceed with this article. If User:ANFO insists on adding more information about this report, I suggest we create a seperate article for this purpose rather than take up more space in the FAO article. In a similar manner I have already created an article on Farmer Field Schools rather than take up space in the FAO article with this topic.APB-CMX 04:55, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

FAO report on Agricultural Biotechnology. I have re-inserted two points into this section. The first is the director general's insistence that people read his introductory speech and indeed the whole of the report, in gaining an overall context, as he regarded this a key point when this issue was raised. The second is to mention the letter of praise for this report by a large grouping of respected, independent scientists, which is fair after highlighting the letter of criticism. In this way, I aim only to redress directly the points raised in criticism (rather than pursuing a PR drive) and achieve fair balance by ensuring all the main facts are present. I hope this matter can be resolved amicably and constructively. ANFO 07:59, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Naming again,sorry

According to the official website [2], It is named now "FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNITED NATIONS". do you think the name should be changed to that? Do you even think that the new name is correct? I'd appreciate a response as I'm translating this version now. --Alnokta 08:28, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

The official name of "Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations" should not be used as the name of this article. We use whatever article names are most common. For example, an article on a person will use whatever name he is most commonly known as, and not necessarily his full name. To distinguish beteen articles that would otherwise have identical names, additional terms are often included like a middle name or something in parenthesis. If we had two articles on two organizations, both known as "Food and Agriculture Organization", then to distinguish between them it would be sensible to rename this one "Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations". But not otherwise. In any case, I think of it as the FAO or UNFAO. WAS 4.250 17:17, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:FAO logo.gif

Image:FAO logo.gif is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in Wikipedia articles constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot 06:21, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Farsi

Is there any particular reason why the FAO's Farsi name should be included in the article? The UN only has six official languages: English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese and Russian. Whiel the FAO's Russian name is missing from this article, it's name in Farsi is mentioned. Has there been a glitch somewhere? If the Farsi name is mentioned, that would mean that its name in any language would be acceptable. V85 (talk) 20:07, 24 September 2008 (UTC) I think this was already corrected. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.76.37.142 (talk) 22:40, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

insertion of new listing of Assistant Director-Generals with only one entry

At any one time FAO has around ten Assistant D-Gs. There is absolutely no reason to list them and certainly no need to list all the ADGs since FAO was founded. It does not make much sense to list even the DDGs. The beginning of a new listing with just one ADG and a very unimportant one at that is pointless. The article should not consist of long lists of names. Mr Reddy is not at all notable and does not merit his own article. He certainly does not merit a listing here. I will continue to delete the insertion. Roundtheworld (talk) 21:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

File:FAO food-price-index 1990-2011.png Nominated for Deletion

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Constitution of the FAO

I submitted the text of the Constitution of the FAO to wikisource. Please include a reference here.--Gulpen (talk) 14:19, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Gaps in article

As presently written, this article says virtually nothing about the FAO's important work in forestry and fisheries. Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 09:49, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Blank section stubs added for future additions re: FAO's forestry and fisheries programs and accomplishments. DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 01:36, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

World Food Summit

This article touches briefly, but currently not very systematically (or evenly) on the World Food Summits. At the same time, there is a separate, short article on that topic. Would it make sense to merge the latter into this article? Perhaps best left separate so World Food Summit can best be developed on its own right. But still I think it would improve this article to strengthen coverage of that subtopic. Suggestions? Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 10:20, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

Hunger campaign & alliance (merge sections?)

What is the relationship between the "Online campaign against hunger" and the "Alliance Against Hunger and Malnutrition"? Is there some way that these two sections might be merged? Does the latter fit better under "Food" rather than "Agriculture" programs of the FAO? Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 21:42, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

'United Nations' is a name

'United Nations' is a name, not a description. 'International Business Machines' is another example of a name (as opposed to a description). The expression 'the United Nations' is therefore confused language, like it also would be mistaken to refer to IBM as 'the International Business Machines'.

It would improve the language of this article if United Nations were properly referred to by using its name as just that, a name. That is to say one should refer to UN as simply 'United Nations', and avoid referring to it as 'the United Nations'. Of course this also applies to 'Food and Agriculture Organization' (a name, not a description). --62.16.186.44 (talk) 03:02, 28 December 2014 (UTC)