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Severe drought, driven by the current El Niño cycle , continues throughout Africa south of the Sahara, and South Africa is one of the countries being hardest hit. According to a new policy brief from the Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy (BFAP), South Africa’s total rainfall in 2015 was the lowest national annual precipitation seen by the South African Weather Service since 1904.

Agricultural risk poses a significant challenge for Malawi, in terms of both its food security and its overall economic development. Looking at two studies conducted in 2014 and 2015 in collaboration with the Government of Malawi, a 2015 World Bank Agricultural Global Practice Note examines the major risks facing Malawian agriculture, how those risks could hurt both individuals and the country as a whole, and what potential steps could be taken to better guard against agricultural losses.

This blog post originally appeared on the Bioversity International blog . It details one of many nutrition-related projects being conducted by CG centers under the Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH) program.

A 3-year research-for-development initiative in the Barotse floodplain, Zambia, supported by the CGIAR research programs Aquatic Agricultural Systems and Agriculture for Nutrition and Health, brought scientists and community members together to improve food and nutrition security all year round.

In recent years, export bans on staple crops have become more and more common as countries attempt to safeguard their domestic food supplies and protect their populations from international food price spikes. Research has shown, however, that such policies often do more harm than good, reducing the prices that local producers receive for their goods and increasing uncertainty in the market for both farmers and traders.

As drought continues throughout southern Africa, the latest FEWS.net alert estimates that 2.5 million people are currently in Crisis food insecurity levels and in need of urgent humanitarian aid across Malawi, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Madagascar, and Lesotho. The organization is also anticipating that the region’s food-insecure population in 2016-2017 will be at least two times higher than current levels.