FAO has used this World Food Day to focus on the position of family farmers, who the Rome-based UN organisation maintains are responsible for feeding 80 percent of the World's population.

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Figures from Brazil suggest that small farmers in the country provide 40 percent of the staple crops consumed by the population, despite only farming 25 percent of the land, and yet in South America, as well as Africa and Southern Asia, small farmers are at a heightened risk of hunger.

The UN organisation has said that, by focusing on supporting small farmers, hunger can be eradicated through supporting those who have an intimate knowledge of the land and local practices, but often don't enjoy the communications, transport or storage infrastructure from which farmers in the global north benefit.   

"The world cannot do without the family farmer," elaborates FAO coordinator Amy McMillen, "It’s because of the family farmer that we eat a variety of healthy foods every day. And yet, family farmers still make up the majority of poor and hungry people in the world. We must do more to incentivize, celebrate and exponentially improve the lives of family farmers to ensure all people have access to fresh, healthy food."

All over the world, events are taking place to mark the international day, with almost 350 events registered in the United States, including the awarding of a World Food Prize and a Food Sovereignty Prize in Des Moines, Iowa. In Rome, the FAO is hosting a range of activities that will go on into the weekend, including a commemoration of the organisation's founding in 1945 and the launch of the latest State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) report.

In a joint statement released on Thursday, Andris Piebalgs and Kristalina Georgieva, EU Commissioners for Development and Humanitarian aid, said, "Today's World Food Day is an opportunity to reflect on how European Union aid is alleviating the world's greatest solvable problem: hunger. As we are about to pass on the work on humanitarian aid and development to the next European Commission, it is time to take stock of what we have achieved and what remains to be done."

The pair said that, though the number of people classed as officially hungry has dropped from one billion in 2009 and 840 million last year to 805 million in 2014, this still represents one in nine people on the planet, and added that "That's still 805 million people too many."

The Commissioners acknowledged that "Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger is the first Millennium Development Goal (MDG) [and] with the MDG deadline now less than 500 days away, we have to up our game."

Pig campaigners: Changing consumer habits could have wide-ranging impacts

In the UK, Farms Not Factories, an animal welfare group which launched its 'Pig Pledge' campaign earlier in the week, with backing from Compassion in World Farming and the Soil Association, released a short video and urged citizens to change their buying habits. The campaign group said that a switch to consuming less but higher welfare meat would carry benefits for small farmers and rural communities as well as the environment and potentially public health.  

The Pledge launch was timed to coincide with World Food Day and, FNF said, it has implications for family farmers and smaller producers who retain a connection with the communities they supply.

Tracy Worcester, Director of Farms Not Factories, said, "Governments are not currently helping to improve pig welfare or restrict the routine overuse of antibiotics in animal factories so it is up to us as consumers to bring about change."

Soil Association Chief Executive Helen Browning added, "We support diverse, human scale farming which enhances the beauty of our countryside and sustains rural communities, cares for the health and welfare of our farm animals, provides meaningful work for people, and develops a flexible, resilient food supply that we can depend on into the future. The solution is not to create huge-scale pig factories that threaten our environment and the wellbeing of rural communities."