Brazil's Jose Graziano da Silva, who takes the helm of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation at a time of high food prices and chronic hunger, boasts a strong record of boosting food security.

Brazil's first ever nominee to the FAO, the 61-year-old professor has devoted his 34-year career to tackling hunger, raising awareness and urging policy changes in the public and private sectors at home and across the region.

Graziano, whose campaign platform included urgent calls for nations and international organisations to present a unified front in the fight against hunger, served from 2006 as FAO assistant head and regional representative for Latin America and the Caribbean.

In that capacity, he prioritised family farming and rural development as a means of tackling the pressing problem of food scarcity and played a key role in founding the "Hunger-Free Latin America and the Caribbean Initiative."

The programme, which focused on exchanging expertise and resources between Latin American and Caribbean countries, saw the region become the first in the world to commit itself to eradicating hunger by 2025.

But it was the former Brazilian food security minister's role in designing and implementing the Brazilian "Zero Hunger" ("Fome Zero") programme before joining the FAO that brought him international acclaim and recognition.

The programme is credited with helping 24 million people out of extreme poverty and reducing undernourishment by 25 percent between 2003 and 2010, using innovative approaches such as transferring cash and power within households to women.

Graziano, who has dual Brazilian and Italian nationality, is expected to start his four-year term with much-needed efficiency reforms in the heavily bureaucratic agency.