Improving soil organic carbon (SOC) storage enhances soil quality and mitigates climate change. Agricultural and livestock specialists increasingly view tropical grasslands as a potential target for storing more soil carbon while boosting productivity. Earlier research in the 1990s showed the promise of improving SOC storage in the Eastern High Plains of Colombia. But these studies were limited to two experimental stations, without focusing on conditions on farms or under variable management.

This paper explores the conditions under which the changes leading to the Great Transformation of food systems called upon by a growing number of international experts and development agencies, will (or not) happen. After discussing the meanings of ‘transformation’ in the specific context of food systems, we draw on different elements of political economy to show how various self-reinforcing dynamics are contributing to lock food systems in their current unsustainable trajectories.

Following the development and dissemination of new climate-smart agricultural technologies to farmers globally, there has been an increase in the number of socio-economic studies on the adoption of climate-smart integrated pests’ management (CS-IPM) technologies over the years. In this study, we review empirical evidence on adoption determinants of CS-IPM technologies and identify possible science-policy interfaces. Generally, our review shows that socioeconomic and institutional factors are influential in shaping CS-IPM adoption decisions of farmers.

Wild foods significantly contribute to the global food basket, and food and nutrition security. Worldwide, wild food species form an integral part of local diets and their widespread assimilation into local food culture suggests an untapped potential to ensure easy availability and access to micronutrients for sustainable food systems. However, wild species are often overlooked within nutrition-related policies, and their levels of availability remain unknown.

To reorient food systems to ensure they deliver healthy diets that protect against multiple forms of malnutrition and diet-related disease and safeguard the environment, ecosystems, and natural resources, there is a need for better governance and accountability. However, decision-makers are often in the dark on how to navigate their food systems to achieve these multiple outcomes. Even where there is sufficient data to describe various elements, drivers, and outcomes of food systems, there is a lack of tools to assess how food systems are performing.

Maintaining staple grains throughout the year and managing liquidity are two major challenges that smallholder farmers face at harvest. We implemented a randomized controlled trial in Tanzania that was designed to address these post-harvest constraints. First, we offered treated farmers two hermetic (airtight) storage bags, which helped preserve grain quantity and quality. Second, we offered other treated farmers a loan at harvest, which reduced the liquidity constraints they faced. Repayment was due with interest six months from harvest when maize prices were traditionally higher.

Globally, youth transitions to adulthood are becoming more complex. The relative importance of key milestones that are used to describe the transition from youth to adulthood are culturally embedded and change across generations. So called ‘critical moments' may include completing education, moving from school to the labour force, leaving home, marriage, and parenthood. In the global south, sub–Saharan Africa in particular, agricultural and livestock assets are also culturally valued and often critical to supporting major achievements in transitions.

Women's empowerment constitutes an important aspect of the development agenda. Although it is highly contextual in nature, empowerment literature so far has focussed on identifying factors associated with empowerment, neglecting the importance of understanding which empowerment resources and agency dimensions are more important for whom and under what contexts. This is important, because we cannot talk of empowerment for those who are not in a disempowered condition or who do not value it.

This guide is a showcase of good practices from around the world that use food systems as a pathway to meet many interconnected biodiversity-related targets in the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. Intended for practitioners and policymakers, it does not set out a ‘one size fits all’ approach but rather good practice examples that have the potential to be adapted and scaled in a variety of food systems around the world.

Mobile phone apps can be a cost-effective way to provide decision support to farmers, and they can support the collection of agricultural data. The digitisation of agricultural systems, and the efforts to close the digital divide and to include smallholders, make data ownership and privacy issues more relevant than ever before.

The challenges identified in the proposal of the CGIAR Research Program (CRP) on Livestock, for enhancing livestock production and productivity, have been the shortage of quality feeds, inefficient utilization of feed resources, degradation of rangelands, and lack of knowledge and skills of stakeholders in the feed production and utilization value chains. To address these challenges, the research and development work, innovations developed and tested, results-dissemination and concerted efforts towards capacity building have been presented in the following three main sections.

Yam (Dioscorea spp.) is cultivated in many villages of DR Congo as a means to sustain food security and alleviate poverty. However, the extent of the existing diversity has not been studied in details thus, considered as an orphan. A survey covering 540 farmers in 54 villages was conducted in six major yam growing territories covering three provinces in DR Congo to investigate the diversity, management and utilization of yam landraces using pre-elaborate questionnaires. Subject to synonymy, a total of 67 landraces from five different species were recorded.