Irrigation contributes to agricultural intensification and farm profitability, helps farm households extend the growing season, and is increasingly important for farmers' resilience to climate shocks and stressors. Until recently, less attention was paid to the other benefits of irrigation, including improvements in household food security and nutrition, health, and women's empowerment.

How does food insecurity affect irregular migration, and what role can a needs-based humanitarian response play? A recent collaboration between IFPRI and the World Food Programme took a route-base approach to looking at irregular migration in West Africa—examining migrant origins, their transit experience, and the situation where their journey stalls or ends. The mixed method study includes case studies of the Ténéré desert crossing, across the south-central Sahara, for Malian and Libyan migrants.

Security in the Sahel is deteriorating rapidly. The number of violent events jumped from 580 in 2018 to over 1,000 in the first half of 2022 alone. Associated fatalities are also up dramatically, from about 2,800 fatalities to almost 6,500. Insecurity is also becoming more widespread, especially in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger. As a result, people are fleeing their homes – the region now hosts over 3 million internally displaced people and over 1 million refugees and asylum seekers.

The Food Systems for Nutrition Innovation Lab (FSN-IL) is a consortium led by Tufts University’s Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, funded under USAID through the Feed the Future Initiative. In the target geographies of Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, the Lab’s goal is to identify and promote uptake of novel technologies, practices or information flows that help in i) reducing food loss and waste, ii) improve food safety, and iii) enhance access to nutrient-dense (often perishable) foods.

Crafting sustainable food systems (SFS) that nourish people and the planet is the imperative of our time. Agriculture and food systems are essential to human survival and are severely threatened by climate change, natural resource degradation and loss of biological diversity. Concurrently, agricultural extensification and unsustainable farming practices accelerate climate change and threaten the ecosystems and many of the natural resources upon which food security depends. Every aspect of these linked problems involves the management of natural resources.

The hungry season—a period of shortfalls in food and savings before the following harvest—is a common feature of life for rural families in many developing countries. To make up for these shortfalls, many farmers turn to casual wage labor to buy food or cut back on investments that could increase next year’s yields. While both decisions keep a family fed, they also compromise the family’s potential. Recent research support by USAID has found a way to mute these impacts and set families up for a better future. 

A new study finds that sustainable food system transformation can be achieved in the next decade in Ethiopia, Malawi, and Nigeria by increasing public investment by US$10 billion per year (on average from 2023 to 2030) and implementing a more effective portfolio of interventions that achieve multiple outcomes.  

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), about one-third of all food produced around the globe is lost or wasted. This is particularly egregious in a world where one in nine persons is food insecure, and widespread food affordability concerns in low- and middle-income countries have resulted from COVID-related value chain disruptions and the global impact of the war in Ukraine. 

Groundwater development is key to accelerating agricultural and overall economic growth, fight climate change, and generate employment in Africa. However, there is also a need to improve groundwater institutions to grow equity and environmental sustainability in groundwater use. This session discusses the African Ministers' Council on Water’s (AMCOW) groundwater program with case studies on the benefits of groundwater development as well as institutional advances in several African countries.

The importance of groundwater development for water and food security in Africa

One year after Russia invaded Ukraine, the war continues to affect global markets. World stock levels remain tight, and while prices have fallen back to pre-war levels, much uncertainty remains. This seminar will examine how the war has affected global markets, particularly wheat markets. Speakers will discuss the war’s impacts on Ukraine’s producers, wheat buyers and importers in the MENA region, and households in Egypt and Yemen. In addition, the discussion will address export restrictions and sanctions that have exacerbated price levels and volatility.