Daniel Balaban, director of the WFP Centre for Excellence against Hunger, delivered lectures on inequality and food and nutritional security at three events throughout the week. Goiânia, São Paulo and Recife were the three capitals that hosted events on these topics.
In Goiânia, Balaban attended the 15th Congress of Teaching, Research and Extension of the Federal University of Goiás. The event took place as part of the National Science and Technology Week, whose theme is “Science for reducing inequalities”. The Congress gathered 6,000 participants including professors and university students on 15 October. Balaban delivered a lecture on the global challenges of fighting hunger and the importance of international cooperation, at the roundtable “Food Security: Reducing Social Inequalities”.
At the 1st Symposium on Combating Food Waste and Promoting Food Security of the City of São Paulo, held on the 16th, Daniel Balaban made the keynote speech of the event. He addressed the challenges of fighting food waste and the importance of eliminating waste for the world to achieve zero hunger. Balaban also presented the South-South cooperation work in food and nutritional security carried out by the WFP Centre of Excellence and highlighted school feeding as a driver for sustainable development.
In Recife, Daniel Balaban opened the National Science and Technology Week of the Federal Institute of Pernambuco. The theme of the event was “The Science for Reducing Inequalities” and sought to dialogue with the Sustainable Development Goals, especially Goal 10 (Reducing Inequalities). Balaban addressed the role of technology and science in reducing inequality and highlighted the contradiction of our societies that develop so much technology but cannot solve basic problems like inequality, poverty and hunger.