5 Pesos FAO

Guiné-Bissau achieved independence from Portugal in September 1974 after eleven years of armed struggle led by the PAIGC, and this 1977 issue was struck just three years into that independence — part of the country's first sovereign coinage series. The FAO designation ties it to a United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization campaign encouraging member states to promote food security themes on circulating coinage, a program that produced an oddly diverse body of numismatic material across dozens of newly independent nations through the 1970s.

The Banco Nacional da Guiné-Bissau itself was established only in 1975, replacing the Portuguese-controlled Banco Nacional Ultramarino. This coin predates the country's catastrophic 1980 coup by just three years.