James Beard, the late American chef after whom the annual James Beard Awards are named, once noted, “Food is our common ground, a universal experience.” Food is the fuel of life. Tomorrow, 16 October, is World Food Day. This annual celebration is sponsored by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. This year’s theme is “Innovate today. Nourish tomorrow.” The following video introduces the topic.

The FAO staff explains, “Forward-thinking solutions, combined with traditional knowledge and inclusive approaches, can help ensure that everyone has access to sufficient, diverse, safe, and nutritious foods, while safeguarding the planet for future generations.”[1]

Innovate today

With the global population continuing to expand — mostly in the developing world — ensuring everyone has enough food to eat will require a great deal of innovation. The FAO staff writes, “Ending hunger is within reach. The world already produces enough food to nourish everyone, yet 645 million people still face hunger, and 2.69 billion cannot afford a healthy diet. As conflict, economic instability and climate shocks put pressure on agrifood systems, the challenge is how to ensure access to reliable, affordable and nutritious food for people everywhere.” The staff is optimistic that solutions can be found. They explain, “Innovation is transforming how food is produced, stored, transported and marketed. It brings together advances in science and technology with the knowledge, experience and ingenuity of farmers, fishers, herders and foresters — including women, youth and Indigenous Peoples — as well as investors, policymakers and entrepreneurs, because transforming our agrifood systems requires collective action.”

When most people think about the food supply chain, their thoughts are drawn either to the field or to the marketplace. The FAO staff, however, is quite aware that all of the in-between activities matter just as much as the endpoints. They explain, “Innovation in agrifood systems takes many forms. It includes digital advisory services, data and information systems, improved seed varieties and biotechnologies, along with farmer field schools, cooperative models, traditional land and water practices, and new approaches to production, markets, finance and distribution. Innovation can also mean reducing risk before crises emerge; preventive and cross-sectoral approaches can strengthen resilience and avoid far higher costs once shocks take place.”

Nourish tomorrow

The FAO report entitled “The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2026,” states, “Ending hunger and all forms of malnutrition, requires not only that people have enough food to eat, but that the food eaten is nutritious. This makes the quality of diets — and the barriers that prevent populations from accessing higher-quality diets — a central concern for policy.” The report observes, “Unhealthy dietary patterns persist worldwide, contributing to a large share of the global disease burden and imposing significant health, economic and social costs on societies.” Individuals in developed countries are just as prone to be eating unhealthy diets as those in the developing world. So, you may ask, what makes a healthy and nutritious diet?

The FAO report states, “Healthy diets are those that meet four core principles that are universal in their application, based on human biology and underpinned by evidence. They should be diverse (composed of a variety of nutritious foods across and within food groups), adequate (in essential nutrients and bioactive compounds without excess), balanced (in dietary energy and its main sources, i.e. fats, carbohydrates, proteins) and moderate (in dietary components that are detrimental to health if consumed in excess). There is strong evidence that such diets are essential for the health of populations, the growth and development of children, and enhanced livelihoods worldwide.”

With the increased global use of GLP-1 drugs to control weight, more and more people realize that eating nutritious foods are just as important as exercise in remaining fit and healthy. However, there are many factors contributing to how well households eat. The FAO report explains, “Several factors promote the consumption of healthy diets among populations, including household incomes, consumer preferences, the structure of agrifood systems and food environments, and the cost of the foods that make up those diets.”

The cost of food has continued to rise and grocery prices have become a political issue around the globe. Affordability is on the top of everyone’s agenda. The FAO report explains, “Affordability of a healthy diet is a major barrier, and it has become more pressing in recent years amid rising food prices. For many households, particularly low-income ones, the cost of nutritious foods places healthy diets out of reach. Understanding how these costs vary and what drives them is essential for designing policies and programs that can improve access to a healthy diet.”

Concluding Thoughts

Although this year’s World Food Day slogan is “Innovate today. Nourish tomorrow,” it could just as well have been “Innovate today. Nourish today.” Today’s population needs healthy diets as much as future generations. The late, great tenor Luciano Pavarotti once said, “One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop and devote our attention to eating.” Our goal should be to ensure that everyone can enjoy regular breaks to savor the joys of food. The FAO staff concludes, “Together, our efforts to foster innovation can build agrifood systems that are more stable, more inclusive and more resilient — capable of nourishing people today while protecting the resources future generations depend on.” Happy World Food Day.

Footnotes

[1] Staff, “World Food Day 2026,” Food and Agriculture Organization.