Food & Agriculture

Civil Society on SDG Engagement: “We Are Not Guests”

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
Showing up in record numbers, civil society groups are urging greater inclusion and accountability in sustainable development processes at a UN high level meeting.

2 Billion People Don’t Have Access To Clean Water, Opens up Fissures of Inequality

By Roshni Majumdar
More than two billion people lack access to clean and safe drinking water, according to a new report released by the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Three-Zone Biosecurity Offers New Hope to Indonesian Farmers

By Kanis Dursin
Poultry farmer Bambang Sutrisno Setiawan had long heard about biosecurity but never gave serious thought to it, even when the highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 forced him to cull thousands of his layer chickens in 2003 and 2009.

Climate Change-Poverty-Migration: The New, Inhuman ‘Bermuda Triangle’

By Baher Kamal
World organisations, experts and scientists have been repeating it to satiety: climate change poses a major risk to the poorest rural populations in developing countries, dangerously threatening their lives and livelihoods and thus forcing them to migrate.

U.S. “Dumping” Dark Meat Chicken on African Markets

By Friday Phiri
The United States and Europe’s preference for white meat is hurting Africa’s poultry industry, says Luc Smalle, manager at the agro firm Rossgro in South Africa’s Mpumalanga area.

Mideast: Water Use Innovations ‘Crucial’ to Face Climate Change

By IPS World Desk
In the Near East and North Africa region, the per capita renewable water availability is around 600 cubic metres per person per year --only 10 per cent of the world average- and drops to just 100 cubic metres in some countries, the United Nations warned.

Progress on World Hunger Has Reversed

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
World hunger has increased, reversing years of progress, said a UN specialised agency.During its biennial conference held in Rome, Italy from 3-8 July, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) noted that the world is facing it’s worst food crisis since World War II.

‘Address African Rural Youth Unemployment Now or They Will Migrate’

By IPS World Desk
In 2014 alone, about 11 million young Africans entered the labour market. But many see few opportunities in the agriculture sector and are constrained by a lack of skills, low wages, and limited access to land and financial services. Combined, this makes them more prone to migrate from rural areas.

Insurance: A Valuable Incentive for Small Farmers’ Climate Resilience

By Friday Phiri
Frequent extreme weather and climate shifts pose a challenge to already vulnerable groups such as smallholder farmers in the developing world. Between 2004 and 2014, farmers are said to have endured the brunt of the 100-billion-dollar cost of climate-related disasters.

Any Way to Help Slow Down Climate Change… Individually?

By IPS World Desk
It is no secret that the biggest responsible for climate change is greed. The greed of the world’s largest private corporations, which blindly seek unlimited high financial benefits. And the greed of those politicians who are also blindly keen about holding their temporary power at any cost, thus not daring to challenge big business. Ordinary people can meanwhile help slow down such a hellish race.

“Black Soils” – Excessive Use of Arsenic, Cadmium, Lead, Mercury…

By IPS World Desk
Soils are polluted due mostly to human activities that leave excess chemicals in soils used to grow food, the United Nations reports.

The World Is Burning

By IPS World Desk
Record high temperatures are gripping much of the globe and more hot weather are to come. This implies more drought, more food insecurity, more famine and more massive human displacements.

Asia-Pacific: Farming Rice and Fish Together to Reduce Poverty

By IPS World Desk
Rice is a major food commodity and staple food for many, and adding fish to flooded rice paddies has been a farming tradition practiced in a number of Asian countries for many centuries—even for more than 1000 years in some Chinese areas, the United Nations reports.

Africa: Drought and Jobless, Hopeless Youth, Fertile Grounds for Extremism

By IPS World Desk
Ignoring the plight of jobless young people in sub-Saharan Africa is a recipe for political instability and global insecurity, warned a high-level symposium of Africa’s interior, environment and foreign affairs ministers in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.

Safeguarding Precious Crop Genes in Trust for Humanity

By Ini Ekott
A genetic resource centre run by the Nigeria-based International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) has banked thousands of crop varieties for disaster relief and research, holds the world’s largest and most diverse collection of cowpeas, and contains some of Africa’s rarest insect species.

Latin America’s Rural Exodus Undermines Food Security

By Fabiana Frayssinet
In Latin America and the Caribbean, which account for 12 per cent of the planet’s arable land, and one-third of its fresh water reserves, a number of factors contribute to soil degradation and to a rural exodus that compromises food security in a not-so-unlikely future.

Africa Could Help Feed the World – If Its Fertile Land Doesn’t Vanish

By Younouss Youn
The 23rd World Day to Combat Desertification was celebrated in Burkina Faso’s capital of Ouagadougou on June 15 with a call to create two million jobs and restore 10 million hectares of degraded land.

BRICS to Lead World’s Efforts to Eradicate Hunger, Poverty by 2030

By IPS World Desk
With the clock ticking toward the 2030 deadline for meeting the international goals to eradicate hunger and poverty, five of the world's most important emerging economies are well positioned to take a leading role in helping to achieve these objectives, according to the United Nations.

IFAD’s President Houngbo Calls for Investment in Climate-Smart Agriculture for Poverty-Free Future

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
Implementing climate-smart agriculture is critical to reduce hunger and poverty, according to International Fund for Agricultural Development’s (IFAD) new president Gilbert Houngbo.

Drought Pushes 1 in 3 Somalis to a Hunger Knife-Edge

By Baher Kamal
Another famine in former European colonies in Africa and another time in its Eastern region, with Ethiopia and Somalia among the major victims of drought and made-made climate disasters mainly caused by US and European multinational business.

The High Price of Desertification: 23 Hectares of Land a Minute

By Busani Bafana
Urban farmer Margaret Gauti Mpofu would do anything to protect the productivity of her land. Healthy soil means she is assured of harvest and enough food and income to look after her family.
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