Imagining Research for Food Sovereignty

In 1994, UPA began the adventure of publishing a Yearbook of Family Farming. The objective was simple, although ambitious: to collect in an annual work the main data, ideas and proposals of this production model, which in the Union of Small Farmers and Ranchers we have defended since our origin. Now,...

Smallholder farmers in India are on the frontlines of the climate and agrarian crisis and they include most of the farming population in the country. They face high input costs, are very sensitive to climate risks, lack knowledge of sustainable agricultural practices, and experience crop yields that are ~50% lower...

Waterlogging and shallow groundwater (GW) have caused many environmental problems in many places worldwide due to poor irrigation and nonfunctional drainage systems, particularly with flood irrigation (Ochoa et al., 2007, Zhang et al., 2021). The groundwater depth (GWD) is often considered an essential factor in controlling ET rates (Devitt et al., 2002). Consequently, higher ET rates...

The path to human health and prosperity depends on the success of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.1 Yet the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are off-track, challenging the fulfilment of essential human needs and jeopardising the integrity of our ecosystems.2 Accessible, nutritious, and affordable food is one of the most fundamental...

Food crises are underpinned by a complex configuration of shocks stemming from climate change1, conflict and social unrest2, displacement and migration3, geopolitical pressures and economic conditions4. Building resilience against acute and protracted food crises5 requires an evidence-based strategy for programme design, policy formulation and optimizing investments. To meet this requirement, the...

Cette publication rend compte des trajectoires contrastées des politiques de sécurisation du foncier pastoral en Afrique de l’Ouest.  Il est courant de souligner qu’en Afrique de l’Ouest, la question du « foncier pastoral » est fréquemment au cœur de l’actualité notamment à travers la fréquence des conflits agro-pastoraux souvent meurtriers,...

Water scarcity is a major challenge in the Sahel region of West Africa. Water scarcity in combination with prevalent soil degradation has severely reduced the land productivity in the region. The decrease in resiliency of food security systems of marginalized population has huge societal implications which often leads to mass...

IIED's biodiversity newsletter is sent out every two months to keep you updated on our work exploring the links between biodiversity, conservation and local livelihoods. In this edition we're delighted to announce the upcoming launch of the REDAA grants programme, as well as share some new blogs and a short seminar...

The international organic certification system can be bureaucratic and expensive, and beyond the reach of smallholder ecological farmers who produce for the local market. In many countries, Participatory Guarantee Systems, or PGS, are emerging as an alternative accreditation system. While PGS systems are created locally and differ from one country...

This Regional Initiative uses a complex, multidisciplinary and area-based development approach, tailored to the Europe and Central Asia region. It takes into consideration the region’s heterogeneity and the special challenges it faces. The overall goal is to address the key problems of rural people by empowering smallholders and family farms to...

During the recent U.N. Food Systems Summit Stocktaking Moment, the World Farmers Markets Coalition highlighted the role farmers markets can play in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. The World Farmers Markets Coalition was launched after the first U.N. Food Systems Summit in 2021. Today, its members, which span 70 countries, point...

On 20 December, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and oriGIn hosted the online event, Third regional consultation on geographical indications in Europe and Central Asia. Some 111 representatives from 34 countries of geographical indications (GIs) groups, national intellectual property offices and the World Intellectual Property...

National Land Policy Study Reports on Senegal, Mali, Togo, Ghana & Cameroon. AFSA is delighted to launch a series of five national reports, within AFSA’s Our Land is Our Life land rights initiative in these countries. These reports aim to: Examine Land Policies and Governance: They seek to understand the national land policies...

Short food chains narrow the gap between producers and consumers, but when food is traded through wholesalers and when supermarkets sell their own brands, active efforts are undertaken to make farmers anonymous. This never really occurred to me until Vera Kuijpers, from the organic farm and farm shop Het Eikelenhof in north-eastern Limburg,...

CARE’s Farmer Field and Business School (FFBS) model focuses on improving small-scale farmers’ productivity, resilience and access to markets. FFBS is a hands-on, learning-by-doing approach through which groups of farmers meet regularly during the course of their value chain production cycle to learn about new agricultural techniques and to experiment...

Illuminating Hidden Harvests: the contributions of small-scale fisheries to sustainable development (hereinafter IHH) is a global study uncovering the contributions and impacts of small-scale fisheries through a multidisciplinary approach to data collection and analysis. The study provides information that quantifies and improves understanding of the crucial role of small-scale fisheries...

Transforming Philippine agriculture remains an urgent need, not just because it is intrinsically connected to food security but also for poverty reduction. The technologies brought by the Green Revolution in the 1960s sparked growth in the sector, but it has remained slow compared to some of its neighboring countries. Although...

In this chapter we argue that industrial food production, distribution and consumption play a central role in perpetuating the present intersecting crises of poor health, biodiversity loss, climate change and inequality. At the centre of our argument lies a contention that multiple rifts (e.g. between humans and nature, urban and...

Several countries across the developing world have designed and implemented agricultural export incentives. However, little is known about the effects of these policies on various aspects of domestic food security. This study utilizes economywide models linked top-down with microsimulation modules to analyze the impacts of increased agricultural export promotion on...