The business imperative: Helping small family farmers to move up or move out
How can family farmers best contribute to their country’s agriculture needs as well as broader development goals? First, we should determine which farmers can be profitable and assist them in doing so. Second, for those who aren’t profitable, we need to help them shift to other economic pursuits.
Food safety: Reducing and managing food scares
A series of high-profile food-related scares around the globe has drawn attention to the issue of food safety and other health risks associated with agriculture. Because the scope of the problem is different at different levels of economic development, we need nuanced policy options to promote safer food production systems worldwide.
Regional developments [In 2014-2015 Global food policy report]
In addition to global developments and food policy changes, 2014 also saw important developments with potentially wide repercussions in individual countries and regions. This chapter offers perspectives on major food policy developments in various regions including Africa, the Middle East and North Africa, Central Asia, South Asia, East Asia, and Latin America and the Caribbean.
Conflict and food insecurity: How do we break the links?
Food and nutrition insecurity are becoming increasingly concentrated in conflict-affected countries, affecting millions of people. Policies and interventions that build resilience to these shocks have the power to not only limit the breadth and depth of conflict and violence around the world, but also strengthen national-level governance systems and institutions.
The rise of aquaculture: The role of fish in global food security
Appetite for fish continues to expand around the globe, despite the stagnant levels of capture fish production. What is the role that aquaculture can play in supplying the world with adequate animal protein? What lessons can be drawn from dynamic Asian aquaculture producers that might guide emerging fish farmers in Africa and elsewhere?
Mitigating risk: Social protection and the rural poor
People in developing countries—particularly the agricultural poor—face a host of risks to their lives and livelihoods, including those stemming from globalization, climate change, and weather shocks. These experiences highlight the importance of social protection, which can have a potentially significant impact on reducing poverty and vulnerability when implemented with the optimal design, targets, and resources.
Ensuring food and nutrition security in rural Nigeria
Malnutrition is widespread in Nigeria, especially in rural areas. Nigerians are vulnerable to chronic food shortages, erratic supply, poor quality food, and fluctuating food prices. The huge investment in ensuring food and nutrition security for Nigerians has had limited success, and therefore, there is a need to review and learn from past interventions. This brief provides a glimpse at rural food and nutrition security in Nigeria and highlights gaps in existing knowledge and capacity to analyze Nigeria's food and nutrition security situation.
2020 Focus briefs on the world's poor and hungry people
Assessing the world’s progress against poverty calls for frequent and careful measurements, using household surveys and price data. Fortunately, the task of measuring poverty is becoming easier, and the results are probably getting more accurate over time. The best data for assessing progress against poverty come from surveys of the living standards of nationally representative samples of households.
Food-security risks must be comprehensively addressed
ecent food-price and economic shocks have further jeopardized the food security of developing countries and poor people, pushing the estimated number of undernourished people over one billion. Known and unknown food-security risks appear to be on the rise. Increasing uncertainties raise critical questions about how to quickly, viably, and sustainably manage familiar risks and emerging new ones.
Developing knowledge and capacity for innovation in food and agriculture
The Knowledge, Capacity, and Innovation Division (formerly ISNAR) works to improve the functioning of food and agriculture systems by facilitating knowledge management—the creation, accumulation, sharing, and utilization of knowledge—and developing the capacity for innovation by all actors along the food and agriculture value chain. Fostering innovation means investing in agricultural science and technology, research and extension, education and training, and farmer organizations and other local institutions.
An assessment of IFPRI's work in Ethiopia during 1995-2010
Ethiopia is one of the most populated and poorest countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and as such has been a high priority country for IFPRI research and capacity-building work. From 1995 to 2004, nearly all of IFPRI’s Ethiopia work was undertaken by Washington-based research teams working on specific themes under various “global research programs” (GRPs). More than 95 percent of IFPRI’s research in Ethiopia during this period was part of four main research themes: (1) Market Development; (2) Poverty and Food Security; (3) Public Investment; and (4) Sustainable Land Management (SLM).