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	Advancing breakthroughs in agriculture for action on climate change by Consultative Group on Agricultural Research   The facts are startling. More than 2 billion people (CDC, 2015) worldwide suffer from micronutrient deficiency – 795 million (FAO, 2015) of whom are undernourished. The challenge to nutritiously and securely feed the growing population is further exacerbated by climate change which has led to extreme weather patterns and decreasing crop yields.   With more than 10% of the world’s population living on less than US$1.90 per day (World Bank, 2016), the imperative to transform food systems in a way that simultaneously improves lives, livelihoods and the condition of natural resources is clear.   Climate change presents a formidable challenge as one of the biggest constraints to improving food systems, food security and poverty alleviation around the world, especially for the world’s most vulnerable people.   The impacts of climate change and poverty are closely interconnected as climate change impacts land availability, rainfall, and disease. With poor people disproportionately dependent on rainfed agriculture for their livelihoods, these communities are thus especially vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.   The increasing frequency and intensity of climatic shocks impinges on their ability to sell an agricultural surplus, meaning less reinvestment in their farms and other livelihood activities, and less ability to purchase a nourishing diet.   The breakthrough Paris Climate Agreement of 2015, while far from perfect, represented an historic and ambitious new phase for climate action, and opened a door for the agricultural sector to take a leading role.   “We recognize that the agricultural sector has a key role to play in increasing resilience to climate shocks. Food security, food production, human rights, gender, ecosystems and biodiversity were all explicitly recognized in the Paris agreement and these are issues at the core of our work,” according to Elwyn Grainger-Jones, Executive Director of the CGIAR System Organization.   Across Africa, Asia and Latin America, CGIAR and its partners are developing climate-smart technologies to help farmers adapt to climate change as well as mitigate agriculture’s contribution to climate change.   The CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) brings together the expertise in agricultural, environmental and social sciences to identify and address this nexus between agriculture and climate change. Innovations such as drought tolerant crops, agricultural insurance schemes and management practices for reducing greenhouse gas emissions are just a few of the technologies being developed by CGIAR.   In Africa, researchers from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) are working on drought tolerant maize which offers African farmers significant benefits, producing up to 30% more grain than conventional varieties under drought. Through beneficial partnerships with governments, private sector and local NGO’s, researchers have fast-tracked varietal releases and fostered competitive seed markets, allowing for widespread access to quality seed at an affordable price.   “A large percentage of resource poor farmers and consumers live in tropical environments, which are most vulnerable to climate change. By providing research-based knowledge and tools, CGIAR is working to help farmers adapt, bringing greater food security and prosperity to these areas,” says Martin Kropff, Director General, CIMMYT and CGIAR System Organization Board Chair. “CGIAR-led research on drought tolerant maize has helped more than 5 million households in 13 countries become more resilient to climate change.”   In Vietnam, Bangladesh and the Philippines, researchers from the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) are developing rice management techniques, known as alternate wetting and drying, in irrigated lowland areas which could save water and reduce greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining yields.   To ensure that agricultural innovation is developed where needed, CGIAR is prioritizing responsive, farmer driven technologies, particularly in relation to climate-smart solutions.   In Senegal, CGIAR-led research on digital advisory and climate information services are reaching farmers with improved seasonal forecasts via radio and SMS – information that is helping farmers adapt to climate change and improve resilience to climate shocks.   In India, researchers from CCAFS are establishing well-designed agricultural insurance schemes which will enhance resilience to climatic shocks and help protect farmers during bad harvests. CCAFS is also working in partnership with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) to help major agribusiness companies improve their ability to trace, measure and monitor climate-smart agriculture progress, among others, by developing science-based indicators.   “The challenge we now have is how to take these innovations to scale, reaching millions rather than thousands of farmers. This requires a transformation in the way we partner and deliver our science, as well as targeting and bundling together climate-smart agriculture innovations,” outlined Kropff.   “We recognize that responding effectively to the challenges of climate change hinges on dramatic changes in the way we work.” Continued Grainger-Jones. “We have a responsibility to foster paradigm shifts which can prepare us for the challenges we face.   Research led by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) is doing just that, testing the impact of feeding animals with climate-smart Brachiaria grass, of which some varieties can tolerate drought and waterlogging, while others have produced more and better forage.   At its core, CGIAR is committed to transforming agriculture and food systems that will enable the most vulnerable to better nourish their families and improve productivity and resilience.   “As the world’s largest agricultural research for development partnership, CGIAR is in a unique position to help to respond to the world’s most complex development challenges. We are committed to leading world class climate change science to increase resilience to sustain the planet’s fragile ecosystem,” reflected Grainger-Jones. Visit the related web page
	Women account for 70 per cent of the world''s hungry by OHCHR, Institute of Development Studies   March 2016   “Women account for 70 per cent of the world''s hungry, and are disproportionately affected by malnutrition, yet they are responsible for more than half of global food production,” said the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Hilal Elver.   “Faced with discrimination on multiple levels, women’s right to access food is affected at all stages of life. Indeed women in many countries receive less food than their male partners, as a result of their lower social status,” said Ms. Elver launching her latest report to the UN Human Rights Council.   “Social segregation based on gender, when combined with other forms of discrimination grounded on religion, race, ethnicity, class and caste, disadvantage women even further,” added the expert.   “Despite their critical contribution to world food and agricultural production, women face difficulties in maintaining household incomes due to increased competition with imported agricultural goods, reduced prices, and declining commodity prices in international market, as well as in engaging in market activities when cultural norms make it socially unacceptable for them to interact with men. Migrant women workers with precarious immigration status and indigenous women are particularly vulnerable,” said the Special Rapporteur.   “Closing the gender gap in agriculture requires the development of gender-sensitive policies. Ensuring land rights, reinforcing the rights of girls and women to education and social protection and increasing women’s participation in decision-making in a meaningful manner are critical”, stressed the independent expert.   “Increasing women’s access to and control over assets has been shown to have positive effects on important human development outcomes, including household food security, child nutrition, education and women’s well-being and status within the home and community”, she added.   On International Women’s Day, the Special Rapporteur encourages States to focus on gender-sensitive policies in all fields, particularly in the context of climate change, in order to achieve further improvements in women’s access to their right to food.   “Respecting, protecting and fulfilling women’s rights will inevitably solve broader problems in food systems in general and can help communities achieve improved development outcomes,” concluded Ms. Elver.   * Access the report: http://bit.ly/1UUUtaW   July 2015   We cannot tackle hunger without transforming gender inequalities   Today, at least 795 million people are experiencing extreme, chronic malnourishment and that number jumps to two billion if micronutrient deficiency or ‘hidden hunger’ is factored in. Nearly 60 percent of the nearly one billion people who go hungry every day are women and girls. They are the poorest of the poor, and they are most vulnerable in the global food system. A new BRIDGE Cutting Edge Report on Gender and Food Security provides a critical lens on the shocking global gender disparities that characterise food and nutrition insecurity.   A look at the evidence makes it clear that gender inequalities are a key cause of this reality. For example, against a backdrop of rapid economic growth, women and girls in India remain among the most food insecure in the world mainly because of entrenched gender biases that de-prioritise their needs and erode their rights. These deep gender inequalities in food security exist even though women constitute the majority of food producers in the world and are often managing their families’ nutritional needs.   Poor women are often doing this despite gendered norms and constraints that restrict their access to productive resources, and global and national forces that push down the market value of their own produce while raising prices of food they need to purchase.   We know that women have little to no access to land and property rights. They often lack access to basic information and basic decision-making power. They can’t get credit, financing and technologies that would drastically improve their productivity, reduce their time and effort, and improve their access to markets.   They receive less training and education than men in agriculture. In fact, two thirds of the illiterate rural poor are women, affecting their chances to improve their lives.   Women also receive less pay for what they do, compared to men, and work in more precarious conditions. And, though women are known custodians of local knowledge, including seeds and medicines, their knowledge is vastly ignored.   These factors not only reduce women’s productivity; they also reduce their capacity, their self-esteem, and undermine their basic rights. Compounding this is the fact that so much of the unpaid work that they do such as collecting water, fuel and caring for their families, is totally ignored in formal data collection and in policies and programmes.   In addition, women’s own nutritional needs – and often those of their daughters – are often being neglected because they are considered of lower status and less of a priority than men and boys in many cultures. Women regularly eat after men and they receive less food than men and boys, particularly in time of crisis when food is scarce. As a result women and girls are more malnourished than men and boys.   When it comes to food stability, enough food to feed everyone, as reported by the UN Food Agencies, has not yet translated into everyone getting enough food to eat. Policies focused on food security need to recognise that food production, processing, distribution, consumption and utilisation are part of often inequitable value chains.   The global food economy, riddled with price volatility and scarcity of resources, has negatively affected the stability of food supply, and women have been left as the shock absorbers of food insecurity.   Climate change patterns and scarce resources continue this pattern with women and children struggling disproportionately than men to provide nutritious food for their families.   Every day, women are putting themselves at risk of violence and sexual assault to find food in areas where food is scarce.   The report argues that a commitment to transforming gender inequalities is a non-negotiable condition for reducing hunger and malnutrition. As part of this process there is a vital need for comprehensive, gender-aware strategies that are grounded in an evidence-based understanding of the complex gendered causes and impacts of hunger and malnutrition, and are coherent across a range of policies and actions. This means both women and men need to work together to realise positive change.   The report notably highlights good work is already being undertaken to strengthen rights-based approaches. For example, some governments, such as India and Brazil, have passed right to food legislation to support smallholder farmers and families living below the poverty line.   In many African countries, civil society groups are working with their governments to promote awareness and action on women’s land rights.   New practices on agro-ecology to promote women’s knowledge and training in sustainable agriculture are being piloted in Central America. New research on making women’s unpaid work is emerging. But far more investment is needed into further developing, adapting and scaling up these types of innovations, and gathering evidence that can ensure funds are targeted effectively in ways that promote the interlinked goals of gender equality and food and nutrition security.   In these way we can begin to make small steps towards realising a vision of gender-just food and nutrition security where the gender inequalities that perpetuate and exacerbate experiences of food insecurity are confronted and transformed; and that is grounded in the recognition that everyone has the right to decent, nutritious food produced in environmentally sustainable ways.   * Alexandra Spieldoch is Executive Director, Compatible Technology International (CTI). Alyson Brody is Senior Gender Convenor at the Institute of Development Studies. http://bridge.ids.ac.uk/topics/food-security   * Gender and Food Security (IDS) 100 page report: http://bit.ly/2ctnslW http://bit.ly/1DdV5vP
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