Blogs

What does a gender just and equitable food system practically look like? A just and equitable food system is one in which women’s roles change from being invisible to being visible.

The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2021 reported that more than half of the world’s undernourished are found in Asia (418 million). In Pakistan, Covid-19 has exposed vulnerabilities and inadequacies making nutrition a more complex challenge now.

 

 

Despite standing to suffer immensely from the decline of biodiversity, agriculture is the lead driver of biodiversity loss, primarily through conversion and fragmentation of habitat and unsustainable intensification.

The number and variety of financial services accessible to the rural poor continues to grow. A recently completed stocktake of IFAD’s rural finance programmes has identified a number of successes, plus some opportunities for further innovation.

Despite the African continent holding the world’s most arable land and the agricultural sector employing over half of the population, Africa is still struggling with food production and food insecurity.

Renewable energy technologies are an increasingly important part of small-scale agriculture. IFAD’s S-RET project is bringing these technologies to farmers throughout Cambodia – and it’s recently been selected as a GEF Global Good Practice Project.

The blue economy opens the space for IFAD to reach more rural people in the most challenging situations, and to get them out of poverty.

Digital agriculture is an indispensable part of strengthening food systems. IFAD’s recent stocktake of our ICT interventions in the Asia-Pacific region has revealed over 50 active solutions and some critical gaps to address.

The Empower@Scale platform helps organizations to address the root causes of gender inequality by incorporating household methodologies (HHMs) into their projects, which address the embedded gender biases and discrimination against women at the household level.

Livestock-based food systems can be climate-friendly if managed well. A new assessment tool is helping governments calculate and predict their livestock emissions for use in their NDCs.

Malnutrition, and the toll it takes on human health and societies, is directly linked with the health of our food systems. Creating sustainable, resilient and inclusive food systems will make lasting improvements in global health, nutrition and productivity.

Peatlands across south-east Asia have been cleared for agricultural purposes, leading to a sharp increase in fires. To reverse course, we need to transition to sustainable, fire-free peatland management practices.

Nigel Brett, Director of IFAD’s Asia and the Pacific Division, interviews Dr Shakuntala Thilsted, Lead for Nutrition and Public Health at WorldFish.

With nearly half of the world’s population living in the rural areas of low- and middle-income countries, tenure security is fundamental for sustainable development.

In Ghana, the value chain model has helped build solid relationships, showing that even the poorest can be brought into commercial value chains if extra support is provided.

"A passion for work is the fundamental ingredient of cooking."

Cooperation among the global south, i.e., South-South and Triangular Cooperation (SSTC), is an integral part of international cooperation, and complements the traditional North-South Cooperation in development assistance.

Those who have the most to lose as a consequence of climate change are poor rural people, especially smallholders who rely on agriculture for survival.

Who could have predicted that two innovative mobile applications, each the winner of a Pacific Agrihack Lab grant in late 2018, would go on to make a difference in the lives of Pacific Islanders during the pandemic?

People in rural areas, especially small-scale farmers, are among those most affected by climate change. The shifting climate has made weather patterns more unpredictable and weather-related events more extreme. 

Farmers in Sierra Leone have shifted from slash-and-burn cultivation to rice cultivation in inland swamps. That is reducing the number of forest fires, a GIS study has shown.

Farmers that lack irrigation and rely on rainfed production are particularly vulnerable to drought. Fortunately, agricultural technologies, such as stress-tolerant rice varieties (STRVs), can help them adapt to climate change. 

Until recently, every time Fatima Hassan Mohamed needed water to wash, cook, or drink, the mother of five had to set out on foot. The nearest water source was more than 20 kilometers away.

A growing number of reports are demonstrating what many development professionals already know about the impacts of COVID-19: women and girls are more vulnerable to the negative health and socio-economic effects of the crisis.

In 2021, the impact of the epidemic and the global economic recession will have an impact on world food security. After the epidemic, what problems will global food security face and how to deal with it?

Many elements involved in IFAD-funded projects. As long as an element’s precise geographic coordinates are known, satellite imagery can be used to monitor any changes that have taken place.

Hunger is both a cause and result of conflict. In fact, conflict is the main driver of hunger in most of the world’s food crises.

As I scroll through the pages of the new photo book The People Behind Your Plate just published by IFAD, I remember my own visits with rural people in remote villages as I travelled around Lesotho to collect recipes for my cooking books.

According to UN reports, the Asia Pacific region is the most disaster-prone region in the world. Nearly 45 per cent of the world’s natural disasters occur in the region. 

As we approach the first anniversary of the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s an important moment to take stock on the impact of the pandemic, and to reflect on what we have learned, and what we can do better going forward.

In 2009, I travelled by road to Timbuktu, Mali on a short field trip. As we made our way down the dusty roads, I remember wondering what could possibly pull this arid, sparsely populated land into relative prosperity.

Poor rural people are among the hardest hit by climate change while contributing little to its causes. They deserve a fair share of climate finance to improve their resilience, and a seat at the table for the global climate talks.

Today is World Soil Day, so let’s dwell a little on this amazing world of earthworms, mites, fungi and microbes.

The adoption of General Assembly resolution 72/279 in May 2018, triggered a consortium of UN organizations to come together and rethink how the United Nations Development System can deliver more coherent, accountable and effective support to help countries achieve the 2030 Agenda. 

In the 25 years since Clayton Christensen coined the term “disruptive innovation,” much has been written about the benefits of shaking up established business practices.

As the world becomes more and more urbanized, many have suggested that cities hold the key to an efficient, sustainable future.

Risk and uncertainty intensify in the agriculture sector – especially throughout Africa.

Agriculture has periodically been shaken up by various technological revolutions. The latest? The advent of digital technologies.

A unique opportunity for China to advance its agricultural and rural transformation agenda.

For rural people, especially low-income rural people, land and livelihood are one and the same.

One billion people – 15 per cent of the world’s population – currently have a disability, and 80 per cent of them live in developing countries. People with disabilities, despite being “the world’s largest minority,” are often overlooked.

All too often, the path to sustainable development is blocked by outdated policies and legislation.

IFAD is always exploring new lending instruments to increase the number of potential financial solutions it can offer. 

Reflecting on the fundamental role that sustainable food production and consumption plays in promoting food security and sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems.

I grew up knowing that Sri Lankan tea was truly something special. People all across my native Egypt competed with each other to bring home those packages with the trademark “Ceylon Tea” stamped on the side.

Although the residents of the global South may live worlds apart from each other, they often face a surprisingly similar set of challenges.

The scale of the challenge has become ever more daunting across the region. 

Lack of access to seed is a common problem for small-scale farmers in Nepal and elsewhere.

Knowing the geographic location of people or things helps us to monitor well-being and assess the impact of events.

The COVID-19 pandemic is creating disruption - but sometimes offers opportunities for innovative solutions for rural farmers.

Chef Lance Seeto is an icon of South Pacific cuisine. He’s also been a supporter of IFAD’s Recipes for Change campaign for more than five years now.

“I joined this project because I believe food can really change the world.”

Small-scale farmers face multiple challenges in Cambodia - with limited access to credit and vulnerability to climate change. 

Four years ago, the residents of Chiquicha were just gathering the first fruits of an irrigation project.

Migrants are essential workers; they contribute to the economy of the places they go and, through remittances, to their communities back home.

In April, the World Bank projected a sharp decline of about 20 per cent in global remittances as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and shutdown. 

Rethinking food systems for healthy diets and improved nutrition.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has led to the loss of millions of jobs in the developed and developing world. 

In a world living with Covid-19, it is clear that supply chains and logistics should be simple and easy to manage. And that’s what several Indian states are doing.

Agricultural extension services play a fundamental role in building producers’ capacities to maintain good agricultural practices.

World Environment Day is a day set aside to raise awareness about environmental issues and encourage protective action. This year’s theme is “Time for Nature.”

Since the COVID-19 virus outbreak, much information and misinformation has been circulated about wet markets and an international rallying cry has been made for wet markets to be better regulated or even closed down.

Resilience has become the talk of the town in the development community.

To take advantage of the potential of AI, IFAD employed machine learning techniques to extract insights from across IFAD’s entire investment portfolio.

One emerging lesson from the pandemic is that those who are already vulnerable are likely to be the most severely impacted. 

In most of Africa, people are more likely to die from starvation caused by the economic fallout from the pandemic than from COVID-19 itself.

Development encompasses a wide range of actions that enables people, communities and nations to thrive even after projects have ended. 

It has been really inspiring to receive updates from the field over the past two months illustrating how IFAD-supported projects are continuing to deliver. 

Last week, the China Grain Reserve Group announced its intention to purchase 22 million tonnes of imported grain during 2020. Should China worry about food security?

This year’s theme for the International Day for Biological Diversity is “Our Solutions are in Nature.”

How can we enhance local capacity to respond to this emergency in an agile and inclusive manner?

Africa has so far escaped the worst health consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. But the continent looks like it could be the worst hit.

We are in the middle of a shift in how development is financed. Impact investing is on the rise.

With most of the world sheltering in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic, ILO estimates that about 2.7 billion people are currently affected by workplace closures.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 820 million people were living in hunger. Tens of millions more will join them if we do not take the right actions, and quickly. 

Past experience tells us that quick, tailored support is required to ensure that the impacts of our projects are protected from the effects of the COVID-19 crisis.

After many years of sustained annual reductions in poverty and hunger across the Asia-Pacific region, the COVID-19 global pandemic is threatening a massive reversal of these gains and driving Asian countries into recession. 

On this day 50 years ago – the first Earth Day had just taken place – and a global movement was born.

With half of the planet’s population locked down, the global economy brought to a halt and the number of cases reaching into the millions, it is clear that the COVID-19 pandemic is the biggest crisis of our time.

The tremendous progress in reducing poverty made by India over the past 25 years could now be reversed because of the unprecedented emergency facing all of us – the COVID-19 pandemic.

Cambodia has made remarkable progress and achieved lower-middle-income status - but the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to strain the entire economy.

An IFAD team in Bangladesh provided a proposal to the Government for a certified safe transport and logistics system for movement of inputs and produce in rural areas.

Amidst the suffering and economic hardship caused by the COVID-19 emergency, one silver lining has emerged: an interruption to the greenhouse gas emissions and environmental degradation stemming from human activity.

The COVID-19 pandemic will reshape all our economic choices. Nations have made a crucial choice in recent weeks, choosing human life over economic growth. 

It is easy to lose sight of the big picture when called upon to act quickly in response to the human tragedy caused by COVID-19. 

By leveraging the tools that internet marketing companies have already honed to reach consumers, governments can deliver quality agronomy advice at scale.

What started as a health crisis could turn into a food crisis unless we take measures now. Preventing a food crisis is key to maintaining the strength to fight back.

As countries prepare for the pandemic the mandate of a rural development organization may seem to some not particularly relevant to the current crisis. 

It has been three weeks since COVID-19 has drastically altered the daily lives of IFAD staff headquartered in Rome and stationed around the world.

Each of the world’s agricultural production systems had millennia to adapt to local climatic conditions, especially in terms of temperature and rainfall. 

It is becoming increasingly clear that the ways in which we produce, market and consume food need to be reconciled with environmental, economic and social sustainability. 

Vulnerability and fragility might not be perfect synonyms, but they share a very similar meaning. Both words refer to something breakable, delicate and frail – something that needs to be handled with care.

Two months have passed since the beginning of the new coronavirus outbreak in Hubei, China. It seems an appropriate time to reflect on the impact of COVID-19 on rural communities in China, and on the importance of investing in rural people in order to build long-term resilience to shocks.

The considerable gains made worldwide in poverty reduction over the last 10 years have been widely recognized. And indeed, in a year when China aspires to complete its 40-year project of lifting some 770 million people across the poverty line, it is clear that a greater proportion of the human population is wealthier today than at any other moment in history.

Agritech – the use of cutting-edge technological innovations in agriculture – is generating a lot of buzz these days. Entrepreneurs and start-ups all over the world are brimming with brilliant ideas for bringing big data, connectivity, and digital platforms into the field, and the results so far have been incredibly promising. 

Although our world continues to urbanise at an alarming rate, there’s no getting away from the fact that agrarian activities will always be necessary.

I have always loved food - how it brings people together, the smells and flavours of new cultures. I guess I associate food most with gathering, communion.

The Henley Forum has recognized IFAD with an award for Advancing Knowledge & Organizational Learning Practice during its 20^th annual conference.

 

Women in Ethiopia and the world over play a huge and growing role in farming and food production. 

Weather index insurance can protect and support smallholder farmers from climate-related disasters, providing them with means to buy food when harvests fail.