News Overview

by Gabriela Fretes OPEN ACCESS | CC-BY-4.0 Over the past four decades, countries in the Latin America and Caribbean region have experienced a rapid nutrition transition. Populations have migrated from traditional diets to diets that rely on energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods high in added sugars, sodium, and unhealthy fats. These shifts are linked to higher levels of obesity among all ages and higher burdens

“Food insecurity and undernourishment are deepening lately in the South Asia including Nepal, according to the 2023 Global Food Policy Report prepared by the International Food Policy Research Institute,” writes Nepal News in a story dedicated to the presentation of the 2023 Global Food Policy Report in Nepal on June 20, 2023. COVID-19 pandemic, Russia-Ukraine war, implications of various natural disasters, energy crisis, global

by Kate Ambler, Jeffrey R. Bloem, Alan de Brauw, and Sylvan Herskowitz OPEN ACCESS | CC-BY-4.0 Agricultural value chains (AVCs) are an essential component of food systems—aggregating, processing, and delivering food to retailers. Without them, consumers throughout the world would have little to eat. Yet a set of key value chain actors—firms in their midstreams—are understudied, even as they

Y HALA ABUSHAMA, ZHE GUO, KHALID SIDDIG, OLIVER KIRUI, KIBROM ABAY, AND LIANGZHI YOU OPEN ACCESS | CC-BY-4.0 The armed conflict that erupted in Sudan in April 2023 has had severe implications for the country’s economy. With disruptions in infrastructure, trade, and agricultural activities, the conflict has led to scarcity of goods, increased food prices, and reduced economic growth. These disruptions

BY LYSIANE LEFEBVRE, VALERIA PIÑEIRO, AND BRIAN MCNAMARA Recent crisis-driven increases in food and nutrition insecurity, coupled with the growing threat of climate change, have highlighted the need for drastic changes in our food systems. In this context, expanding the cultivation and consumption of neglected crops presents a valuable opportunity to improve livelihoods and nutrition and reduce environmental impacts of food

by Sarah Ann Wheeler and Claudia Ringler OPEN ACCESS | CC-BY-4.0 Access to safe, clean water is a basic human right. But water scarcity or barriers to access can cause conflict within and between countries. Fights over water can be expected to intensify as the world warms, evaporation increases and rainfall becomes less predictable. So we’ll need to work even harder

by James Thurlow and Faaiqa Hartley OPEN ACCESS | CC-BY-4.0 Climate change poses significant challenges for global economic development and food systems, particularly for low-income countries and vulnerable populations. Policymakers are facing a daunting task of designing effective policies to address climate risks and making long-term investment decisions under growing uncertainty. Ideally, governments would have access to advance information

Groundwater is a key source of freshwater for drinking and irrigation that also has important ecological functions. But this common-pool resource is being rapidly depleted in many places around the world, due to the recent availability of cheaper well-drilling technologies and more affordable pumps, as well as rising pressure from climate change and larger populations that consume more nutritious crops