Risk and Resilience

As fall armyworm continues to spread across Africa, policymakers and development partners have increased their efforts to stop the pest’s reach and to mitigate its impact on the region’s agricultural production and food security.

This post originally appeared on the IFPRI.org blog .

B Andrew Reid Bell, Patrick Ward, Lawrence Mapemba, Tim Benton, Klaus Droppelmann, Jennifer Zavaleta Cheek, Frazer Mataya, and Oliver Pierson

As climate change continues to bring more frequent weather shocks, such as drought and flooding, and make rainfall patterns more erratic, smallholder farmers in developing regions like Africa south of the Sahara are often hardest hit. A new e-book from IRIN reports that mean temperatures in the region are expected to rise faster than the global average, leading to reduced agricultural yields and increased poverty and food insecurity.

Ethiopia will continue to face significant food insecurity in 2018, according to several recent reports from FEWS Net and FAO GIEWS.

Several countries in Africa south of the Sahara faced the threat of famine and high food assistance needs in 2017, and FEWS Net is reporting that little change is expected in the coming year .