One of the cruelest paradoxes of our time is that as world hunger increases, a significant amount of food is either lost or wasted. Successfully reducing food loss and waste would make a substantial contribution to decreasing global hunger and malnutrition. We all have a part to play, not only for the resources that go into producing food, but also, and more importantly, for the 821 million who go to bed hungry every night. Join us for a technical discussion on the key findings of FAO’s...

Climate change is upon us. In places like Nepal, where two-thirds of the labor force rely on agriculture to earn a living, the impacts of rising temperatures, shifting rainfall patterns, and protracted droughts are becoming especially severe. The U.S. government is expanding its investment in programs that build climate resilience, but how can we ensure these investments are inclusive and beneficial to the most vulnerable populations?   Please join us for a panel discussion and the launch...

Please join the CSIS Global Food Security Project for a discussion with a panel of experts on the relationship between climate change, political instability, and food security using current events on the African continent as a lens. The emerging consensus is that climate change poses significant national security threats. However, specific linkages between climate change and political instability are still opaque. As climate change reshapes the agricultural landscape across Africa, there is...

The air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat all rely on biodiversity – but the demands of a growing population and the practices of unsustainable agriculture are compromising access to humanity’s most basic needs. This was the message from two recent reports launched by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations' (FAO) publications: Biodiversity for Sustainable Agriculture and The State of the World’s Biodiversity for Food and Agriculture.   The reports detailed...

Download the EVENT SUMMARY The CSIS Global Food Security Project invites you to join a discussion with a world-renowned expert and advocate on the opportunity for U.S. foreign policy and business to improve global nutrition. Dr. Lawrence Haddad, Executive Director of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN), was awarded the 2018 World Food Prize for his exemplary leadership in maternal and child nutrition and efforts to significantly reduce childhood stunting. Please join us...

The CSIS Global Food Security Project and the CSIS Africa Program invite you to join a discussion on the economic decline and food insecurity crisis in Zimbabwe. According to the Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee’s 2018 Rural Livelihoods Assessment, nearly 2.4 million people in rural Zimbabwe were projected to be severely food insecure by March 2019. In the wake of Cyclone Idai, Zimbabwe's dire condition seems poised to worsen. If the current trends continue, Zimbabwe could be...

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has been widely hailed for his promises to open political space, usher in economic liberalization, and remake the country’s poor record on human rights. However, to truly transform his country, Dr. Abiy must first transform agriculture, which is the nucleus of the Ethiopian economy and by far the largest employer. Please join us for the launch of our newest report, Building a Big Tent for Agricultural Transformation in Ethiopia, which examines the past...

Please join the CSIS Global Food Security Project for the launch of our newest report, Risk and Resilience: Advancing Food and Nutrition Security in Nigeria through Feed the Future, by Julie Howard and Emmy Simmons. The report examines what the new Feed the Future strategy's emphasis on resilience means in Nigeria, one of the newly-designated target countries. Nigeria, with the continent’s largest economy, is arguably the most important partner for the United States in Africa and is on the...

For 25 years, the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte has been an unsung hero in the fight against food insecurity. As Dr. M. Jahi Chappell put it, “The course to universal food security will never run smooth[ly], but steps forward have and can be made. Belo Horizonte has walked a bit farther down the path than most.” Annually, the municipal government’s Under-Secretariat of Food and Nutritional Security spends upwards of $27 million running affordable “Popular Restaurants” that serve 14,000...

The dramatic changes in the flow of migrants across international borders, as well as accelerating internal movements of rural migrants towards cities, are reshaping our world. For many smallholder farmers and herders, moving away from rural areas is an attractive opportunity to diversify livelihoods, escape slow-onset events such as climate change and environmental degradation, seek improved social services, and reunite with family members.   For both origin and receiving communities,...

Efforts to improve nutrition are among the most transformative and cost-effective interventions in global health and food security. Affecting one in three people globally, malnutrition is inherently intertwined with other pressing health and development challenges. As the single largest donor to global nutrition efforts, the United States plays a critical role in addressing malnutrition and advocating greater global support. Uganda, as a focal country of U.S. nutrition, health, food security,...

  Addressing global hunger, poverty, and malnutrition has become a critical U.S. foreign policy objective and a national security measure. Whole-of-government efforts to increase agricultural production and reduce child malnutrition in target countries have earned bipartisan Congressional support and leadership, as demonstrated by the historic passage of the U.S. Global Food Security Act in July 2016. With the legislation up for reauthorization this summer, now is the time to reflect on the...

Current social movements have focused an overdue spotlight on the disadvantages faced by women and girls around the world. Join us for a discussion of both the challenges of persistent gender inequality and the inspiring strength and resilience of women and girls, especially vis-à-vis their contributions to food and nutrition security in unstable environments. Natural and manmade disasters often reinforce and even augment gender disparities, undermining women’s prospects for recovery. The...

Cash transfer social protection programs have become increasingly prominent as a tool to combat food and nutrition insecurity worldwide. In Ghana, under the U.S. Feed the Future initiative to reduce extreme poverty and the prevalence of stunting, USAID collaborated with UNICEF to expand the country’s  flagship national social protection program, the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) Program, to a new group of beneficiaries: pregnant women and children under 12 months...

Please join us for a presentation and armchair discussion with Alex de Waal, the author of “Mass Starvation: The History and Future of Famine.” Considered one of the leading experts on Sudan and the Horn of Africa, de Waal has crafted a comprehensive history of modern famines and the factors that influence their origins, duration, and severity in his latest book. This work is particularly timely with an unprecedented number of countries facing possible famine conditions in 2018—Nigeria,...

Agricultural markets are more connected and capable of delivering economic opportunity and food security today than ever before. As agricultural markets have evolved, so have the rules and regulations governing agricultural trade and value chains. For smallholder farmers in countries like Kenya and India, this new landscape presents both new opportunities and daunting challenges.  A bottom-up approach to agricultural policy and regulation is necessary to bridge the needs at the farm with the...

The 2014 Farm Bill – a critical piece of legislation that authorizes a multitude of U.S. food and agricultural programs –  is up for renewal in 2018. Funding for agricultural research constitutes only a small fraction of the total Farm Bill budget. However, Farm Bill authorizations are the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s primary source of revenue for conducting agricultural science, extension, and education programming through both its own agencies and Land Grant institutions. Despite high...

Smallholder farmers are key actors in the global food system, producing roughly 80 percent of the food consumed in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. Yet, the voices of smallholders are often neglected by policy makers when trade deals are negotiated or regulations are established. Increasing the participation of smallholder farmers in agricultural trade has the potential to boost livelihoods, to improve food security, and to fuel economic growth.   Within an international trade regime marked by...

More than 20 million people in Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan, and Nigeria are facing famine conditions and possible starvation. It has been called the largest humanitarian crisis the world has seen in decades. Of the $4.9 billion the United Nations desperately needs to respond to these crises, only $2.5 billion has been received. Meanwhile, the humanitarian disaster is deepening, largely due to escalating conflict in each of the four countries.   Humanitarian assistance and international...