During World War II, representatives of forty-four nations met to discuss improving the living standards of the world’s hungry poor by influencing scientific, technological, and economic aspects of world food production and trade. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations was formed at this conference, which was called by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt at the urging of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.
In his now-famous Four Freedoms
Nutrition, the scientific study of how calories, vitamins, and nutrients affect human health, was still a relatively new science in the early twentieth century. Increasing knowledge of nutrition created the idea that a nation, by promoting and nutrition and food production, could improve the health, living standards, and productivity of its citizens and the citizens of less-developed nations. With new standards of adequate nutrition, malnutrition was exposed in populations of every nation of the world, even the affluent. Malnutrition proved to be a symptom not only of agricultural shortcomings but also of problems in infrastructure and trade, economics, dissemination of information, and the governance of nations.
The International Institute for Agriculture
Even while the storm of World War II was gathering, several publications linking economics and nutrition catalyzed an interest in food and agriculture as a means of improving living standards. As a member of the League of Nations, Frank L. McDougall began working with American and British nutritionists to establish political policy on nutrition. In 1935, McDougall analyzed the dire findings of these specialists and wrote The Agricultural and the Health Problems.
McDougall, who continued to research and write extensively to promote solutions for food insecurity, produced a memorandum for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on international food problems. Called “Draft Memorandum on a United Nations Programme for Freedom from Want of Food,”
Eleanor Roosevelt, after reading McDougall’s memo, arranged a meeting in response. She encouraged President Roosevelt to organize a conference. Despite the perils of travel, forty-four nations sent representatives to Hot Springs, Virginia, from May 18 to June 3, 1943. Attendees included representatives from Australia, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, France, Great Britain, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Iceland, India, Iran, Iraq, Liberia, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, Poland, Union of South Africa, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, United States of America, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Yugoslavia. A representative from Denmark unofficially attended.
Roosevelt named Judge Marvin H. Jones
Many of the participating nations sent topical specialists—namely in agriculture, trade, and statistics—rather than strictly diplomatic representatives. Consequently, scientific and economic subjects were covered along with political subjects. Participants made recommendations on nutrition, malnutrition and disease, the formation of national organizations, the exchange of information and technology, the gathering and dissemination of statistics, research, cooperative efforts in water and land management, and international security for food production and trade. Politically tense topics included a funding structure for the organization, provisions for market control, and consequences for both food-producing and food-importing countries. Conference attendees, however, agreed on the major goals of improving national diets, increasing food production, disseminating technical and scientific knowledge, and creating a permanent international organization. The name Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) was established.
The Interim Commission on Food and Agriculture
The interim commission’s first charge was to draft the FAO constitution. It planned the scope of activities for the Food and Agriculture body of the United Nations. The commission’s first report to participating nations included the draft constitution. When the constitution was acceptable to the forty-four nations, the FAO would have its first official conference.
The interim commission established committees and subcommittees to prepare reports on important topics, including nutrition and food management, agricultural production, fisheries, forestry, and statistics. Forestry was not originally discussed at the Hot Springs Conference, but it was advanced by the interim commission. The commission also recommended that the IIA be merged into the new FAO. With the signing of the FAO constitution at the first session of the Food and Agriculture Conference
The problems of wars and famine that haunted the first half of the twentieth century brought food and hunger to the forefront of policy makers’ consciousness. Contemporary developments in economics, agriculture, and nutrition paved the way for food policies that could improve living standards for all on an international level. These advancements, combined with the twentieth century interest in the development of intergovernmental agencies, made the FAO a flourishing entity.
The FAO, the first specialized agency of the United Nations, has improved awareness of and standards for nutrition, particularly among rural and poorer nations. The FAO continues to promote scientific and economic initiatives in peacetime, and it organizes humanitarian relief in times of drought, famine, and war. The FAO has grown to be the largest agency in the U.N. system, with 180 member states and more than 4,300 employees.
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Aall, Pamela, Daniel T. Miltenberger, and Thomas G. Weiss. Guide to IGOs, NGOs, and the Military: In Peace and Relief Operations. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 2000. An overview of the FAO’s role among specialized agencies in the late twentieth century. -
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. http://www.fao.org. The Web site for the FAO, which includes many resources. Includes links to online primary sources, including the FAO’s original constitution, signed in 1945. Highly recommended. -
Hambidge, Gove. The Story of FAO. New York: Van Nostrand, 1955. A definitive source on the conditions leading up to the conception of the FAO. -
Hoopes, Townsend, and Douglas Brinkley. FDR and the Creation of the U.N. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1997. Examines President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s role in creating the United Nations. -
Miller, Berna, and James D. Torr, eds. Developing Nations. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Greenhaven Press, Thomson/Gale, 2003. Examines the social, economic, moral, and ethical implications of a world in poverty. -
O’Brien, John B. “F. L. McDougall and the Origins of the FAO.” Australian Journal of Politics and History 46, no. 2 (2000): 164-174. Describes Frank L. McDougall as a driving force in the international food and economics movement. -
Phillips, Ralph W. FAO: Its Origin, Formation, and Evolution, 1945-1981. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization, 1981. Introductory chapters list the key players leading up to the Hot Springs Conference. -
Staples, A. L. S. The Birth of Development: How the World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization, and World Health Organization Changed the World, 1945-1965. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 2006. Focuses on the development of international organizations in the post-Cold War period that pioneered issues such as worldwide economic development and its necessary role in enhancing the quality of life for all individuals. -
Wells, Robert N. Peace by Pieces: United Nations Agencies and Their Roles. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1991. Describes the historical foundations and the scope of U.N. agencies, comparing and contrasting FAO with other international food agencies.
Oxford Committee for Famine Relief Is Founded
Famine Decimates Bengal
World Health Organization Proclaims Health a Basic Human Right
UNICEF Is Established
Eisenhower Begins the Food for Peace Program
Famine Decimates China
United Nations World Food Programme Is Established
European Economic Community Adopts the Common Agricultural Policy
Hardin Argues for Population Control