By Yossef Ben-Meir* Marrakech, Morocco | 4 June 2025 (IDN) — The Kingdom of Morocco is taking the wise measure of building 36 storage facilities that will serve the people’s serious needs during severe crises, should they ever arise, such as with the horrifying 2023 earthquake in the High Atlas region. Ancient knowledge captured in […]
Peace Corps: The Third Rail of US Global Development Assistance
By Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir* MARRAKECH, Morocco | 27 April 2025 (IDN) ― Whereas there has been broad consensus that the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is in need of reform, there is also an even wider and more deeply held belief that the value of Peace Corps ― begun in 1961 ― is […]
RFK Jr. vs. Modern Farming: What’s at Stake for America’s Food Supply
By Dan Kelley* NORMAL, Illinois USA | 4 February 2025 (IDN) — “There are people in every time and every land who want to stop history in its tracks,” said Robert F. Kennedy in 1964. Those words resonate today as Congress considers the nomination of his son, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for Secretary of Health […]
Sri Lanka: Better Manage the Water Tanks to Ensure Food Security
By Mohan Seneviratne* COLOMBO, Sri Lanka | 16 January 2025 (IDN) — Water is at the centre of economic and social development. It influences whether communities are healthy places to live, whether farmers can grow food and underpins natural ecosystems. Moreover, humans experience Climate Change through water be it floods, droughts, cyclones or tsunamis. Sri […]
India: Farmers Intensify Battle Against Big Corporates in Agriculture
Since 2020, Indian farmers have been agitating against repeated attempts by the ultra-right-wing BJP-led government to open the country’s agricultural sector to big corporations. By Abdul Rahman DHAKA, Bangladesh | 8 January 2025 (IDN) — Thousands of farmers participated in the Kisan Mahapanchayat, or farmers gathering, in Tohana, Haryana province, on January 4. The gathering […]
UN Warns of Hunger Reaching New Heights in the Arab Region
By Ramesh Jaura BERLIN | 20 December 2024 (IDN) — Six UN agencies have called for enhanced funding for transforming and strengthening agrifood systems, address inequalities, and ensure that healthy diets are affordable and accessible to all in the Near East and North Africa as a new report warns that the Arab region remains off-track […]
Colombia: Women-Led Fish Farming Is Offering an Alternative to Drug Crops
By Iñigo Alexander* BOGOTÁ, Colombia | 11 December 2024 (IDN) — The Amazon rainforest in southern Colombia stretches lush and green across the horizon, but beneath its dense canopy lies a shifting reality. The southern province of Putumayo—a remote region bordering Ecuador, at the edge of the country’s Amazon—has long been dominated by coca plantations […]
After COP29, What’s Next for Food and Agriculture and the Climate Crisis?
By Food Tank* BAKU, Azerbaijan | 25 November 2024 (IDN)–The United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP29, in Baku, Azerbaijan, (which concluded November 23) focused on securing financial investment to move global climate progress forward. Rich industrialized nations were asked to recognize and repair the harm they’ve caused, and everyone knew beforehand that negotiations might […]
COP29: Focus on Food Systems
By Danielle Nierenberg* BAKU, Azerbaijan | 17 November 2024 (IDN) — We talk a lot about storytelling here at Food Tank, and for good reason: The stories we tell matter. They shape how we approach interacting with our neighbors, transforming systems, and building a better world. The question of who tells our stories matters, too! […]
What Promotion and Cultivation of Millet Means for Africa’s Food Security
By Shmuel Ja’Mba Abm* ACCRA, Ghana | 8 November 2024 (IDN) — The year 2023 was the year millet was declared by the United Nations as the Crop of the Year. Apart from its nutritional values, scientists have discovered, that millet doesn’t only reverse diabetes (type II) but it also prevents the onset of diabetes. […]