www.fao.org
HQ: Rome, Italy
Focal Points: Tina Mittendorf, Giulia Cavo
Email: [email protected]
Internal Sustainability Team: One part time staff, one full time staff, three full time consultants, one intern
DIRECTOR-GENERAL'S MESSAGE
“As we look at the current state of our planet, at the loss of biodiversity, rising sea levels, ecosystem degradation, and the negative effects of climate change, it is clear that the time for action is now.”
Qu Dongyu, Director-General, FAO
Mission
FAO’s Strategic Framework seeks to support the 2030 Agenda through the transformation to MORE efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable, agri-food systems for better production, better nutrition, a better environment, and a better life, leaving no one behind.
Field Offices
http://www.fao.org/about/who-we-are/worldwide-offices/en
ALIGNMENT WITH THE STRATEGY FOR SUSTAINABILITY MANAGEMENT IN THE UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM, 2020–2030
In May 2021, the FAO Director-General formally inaugurated the new Corporate Environmental Responsibility (CER) Strategy 2020-2030. The new CER Strategy serves as both a mandate and a roadmap for a 45 percent reduction in the absolute amount of CO2e emissions released into the atmosphere by 2030, compared to 2018 levels. This is in line with the overarching Strategy for Sustainability Management in the UN System 2020-2030, as four of the five environmental impact areas, and the six management functions are included in the new FAO Strategy. Biodiversity is treated separately, as FAO has recently launched the dedicated Strategy on Mainstreaming Biodiversity across Agricultural Sectors.
Emission Reduction
The largest sources of FAO emissions are associated with facilities, fleet management, and air-travel, with air travel accounting for around 50% of the Organization´s environmental footprint.
Since around 2008, FAO has incorporated many in-house sustainability initiatives, primarily related to facilities, travel, and procurement.
FAO has further scaled up the scope and ambition of its sustainability ambitions and commitments, which are encapsulated in FAO´s Corporate Environmental Responsibility Policy and Strategy 2020-2030. With the development and implementation of these frameworks, FAO has committed to integrating holistic environmental considerations into its facilities and operations, both at FAO Headquarters and FAO Decentralized Offices.
Since 2016, building related emissions have shown a steady decrease trend since across FAO.
In 2020, emissions from FAO facilities dropped significantly by 52% and air travel emissions dropped by 76% compared to the previous year, due to the restrictions of the covid pandemic crisis. Overall, FAO emissions experienced a decline of 61.6% Organization-wide in 2020. This trend continued in 2021, during which time total FAO emissions fell by a further 15%.
There was a rebound of emissions in the 2022 reporting year. Total emissions increased to 29,894 tCO2eq, up by 70% relative to the previous year. This is attributable to employees returning to the office and undertaking more travel as restrictions were lifted. Emissions from stationary combustion have notably increased. Power outages and other factors have contributed to these rises, underscoring the need for accurate reporting and exploration of hybrid solar systems. Large fluctuations in fleet emissions also indicate the need for a fleet management system to improve reporting accuracy.
The 2023 results show a further increase of 35.4 percent compared to 2022 emissions. While emissions from facilities remained notably low—down 43 percent compared to 2018—business travel was the primary driver of the rebound. Air travel emissions, which accounted for 60 percent of total emissions, surged by 88 percent compared to 2022. This rise underscores the renewed demand for travel as FAO’s operational activities expanded, with the Organization’s biennial budget (regular programme + extra budgetary) for 2022-2023 increasing by 27 percent compared to 2018-2019.
In 2024, emissions show a clear plateau. The marginal reduction compared to 2023—only a 0.4% overall decrease—suggests we may have reached a new baseline following the pandemic years. Global emissions remain 16% below the 2018 baseline, which is not sufficient to stay on track for the -45% reduction target by 2030. This reduction continues to be driven primarily by lower carbon footprints from facility use, while air travel remains the largest source of emissions. Significant additional efforts will be required in the coming years to address this challenge.
EMS and Reduction Efforts
An EMS has been implemented at FAO Headquarters and a pilot EMS is in place in the FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Bangkok. The CER Strategy 2020-2030 further outlines commitments to developing more environmental action plans in FAO Decentralised Offices and an EMS framework at entity level.
FAO has had great success in increasing the prevalence of renewable energy in the Organization, contributing to GHG emission reductions. Since 2016, solar systems have been successfully installed in the Regional Office for Africa in Ghana, the Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Thailand, the Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean in Chile, and in the Country Offices of Nepal, Djibouti, Uganda, Mauritania, Jordan, Congo, Burundi, Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone, Bangladesh, Botswana and Eritrea, Pakistan, South Sudan and Guinea Bissau.
These success stories have triggered the interest from many COs, and FAO is now developing on average of 2-3 solar PV systems per year. To capitalise on this momentum, FAO has launched a Call for Expression of Interest: Energy Efficiency and Sustainability in FAO DOs in June 2022, which led to the release of 1M USD of CapEx funds in 2024 to finance solar and LED projects in 10 Decentralised Offices. All projects are being finalized by Q1 2026.
Offices are also developing sustainability action plans, single use plastic bans, and awareness raising initiatives, improved waste management, lighting or HVAC upgrades etc on their own initiative, and taking an increasing interest in sustainability.
An action-oriented and collaborative approach has been adopted to ensure the success of the Strategy. Representatives from FAO divisions and regional offices, supported by the Corporate Environmental Responsibility Team in FAO Headquarters, have established a working group for the implementation of the CER Strategy 2020-2030. This working group meets twice a year to report on activities, share best practices, foster collaboration and coordination, and to identify challenges and opportunities for a holistic integration of sustainability considerations across FAO.
Each year, as part of the Greening the Blue Report on Environmental Governance, each participating UN entity’s progress on the development of an Environmental Management System (EMS) is evaluated according to the UN system’s EMS criteria (these criteria are available on the Methodology webpage). Upon this evaluation the entity is then rated Exceeds, Meets, Approaches, or No response. For the 2023 reporting year, FAO’s progress on the EMS is rated as: Approaches.
FAO is currently working to address the remaining gaps to fulfill all the EMS requirements and being rated as "Meet" in 2025/2026.
Waste Management
At HQ, waste monitoring and waste separation is part of the waste management contract. Single use plastic items have been banned from catering services. This has been further supported by awareness raising campaigns, as well as a behavioural science pilot project designed to understand how recycling rates in FAO HQ might be further improved. The outcomes of this pilot are being used to implement new scientifically informed signs to better guide employees and improve the recycling rate in HQ, and to identify possible measures that can be replicated in Decentralised Offices.
In decentralised offices, waste reporting is mainly done through the annual environmental inventory exercise. Over the years, we have achieved a participation rate of over 90% of the consulted offices. However, only 34.5% of the reporting country offices declare to have recycling procedures in place, and the recycling rate is generally very low (average 18%).
Waste management is an area where FAO will focus its efforts in the future, in line with the UN commitment and objectives outlined in the Strategy for Sustainability Management in the UN System 2020-2030 – Part I, and the FAO Corporate Environmental Responsibility Strategy 2020-2030.
In 2024, FAO has also undertaken renewed efforts to raise awareness around issues of food waste: food waste sorting stations and smart scales have been installed in all catering areas and kitchens in HQ. This serves as powerful awareness raising tools and allows the collection of insightful data. In 2025, the Regional Offices for Asia and the Pacific (RAP) and for Latin America (RLC) followed HQ example and installed food waste monitoring stations in their canteens.
Water and Wastewater Management
Presently, water management only consists in monitoring water consumption at HQ and in decentralised offices through utility meters, and in raising awareness towards water saving measures and basic technologies.
Water reporting is mainly done through the annual environmental inventory exercise. Over the years we have achieved a participation rate of 90% of the consulted offices.
Water and wastewater management is an area where FAO will focus its efforts in the next future, in line with the UN commitment and objectives outlined in the Strategy for Sustainability Management in the UN System 2020-2030 – Part I and the FAO Corporate Environmental Responsibility Strategy 2020-2030.
Environmental Training for Personnel
In April 2025, FAO has launched a new e-learning course, Understanding Corporate Environmental Responsibility, which is mandatory to all staff.
This 35-minutes video-based course is driving meaningful action across the Organization, reaching an 88 percent staff completion rate in only 6 months, with non-staff personel being highly encouraged to participate
The course, which aims to equip staff with basic knowledge and tools to understand how everyone can lessen their environmental footprint in professional and personal settings.
Offsetting
FAO is regularly monitoring its footprint through its annual environmental inventory exercise, which is used to calculate the total emissions associated with operations and buildings. It includes both Headquarters and Decentralized Offices. In this way, FAO can identify good practices or inefficiencies at the office, country, and organizational level.
In the first few months of each year data collection takes place. All Decentralized Offices are contacted and invited to provide data for the previous year.
The exercise accounts for GHG emissions issued from the use of:
- Energy
- Stationary combustion (e.g., fuel for power generators)
- Refrigerant gases for air conditioning systems
- Mobile sources (air travel, rail, boat, bus, car/vans)
The exercise further estimates water consumption, as total waste generation and recycled fraction, and the presence of sustainable procurement practices and take-back schemes
For the minor offices that do not report data, proxies are used to estimate their emissions. Normalization factors for proxies are based on climatic zones of the office, the number of personnel, and the office floor space (m2). Accuracy of data has improved over the years, especially regarding decentralised offices.
The total amount of GHG emissions deriving from flights, trains, bus, boats are calculated using the ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator.
The unavoidable GHG emissions are offset by purchasing Certified Emissions Reduction credits.
FAO has purchased Adaptation Fund Certified Emission Reductions from the Clean Development Mechanism for the purpose of compensating the unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions from the operations and travel of the Food and Agriculture Organization since 2014. The amount of GHG emissions to offset every year correspond to the figures displayed on top of the page.
The offsetting is done for the whole Organization (HQ and all decentralised offices) and covers 100% of the areas where FAO has operational and/or financial control (buildings, fleet and official travels).
RESOURCES
- Corporate Environmental Responsibility website
- Corporate Environmental Responsibility Strategy 2020-2030
- Corporate Environmental Responsibility Policy
- Corporate Environmental Responsibility reports:
- Greening FAO HQ Video
- Latest CER news and stories
- FAO Strategy on Climate Change 2022-2031
- FAO Framework for Environmental and Social Management (FESM)
- FAO Strategy on Mainstreaming Biodiversity across Agricultural Sectors.