By Joanne Burge, IAEA Office of Public Information and Communication VIENNA (IDN | IAEA) — Animal diseases and crop pests can badly affect food supply and economies. Managing these problems can result in farming practices that involve the use of chemicals, which can lead to another problem: unsafe levels of chemical residues and contaminants in […]
Agroecology, The Antidote for Climate Change?
By Busani Bafana SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt (IDN) — The world needs to dump the false solutions of industrial agriculture for food and nutritional security and adopt agroecology in tackling climate change, says Edward Mukiibi, president of Slow Food, a global organization promoting local food and traditional cooking. Agroecology rejects chemical fertilizers and tackles climate change […]
Funders Commit to Restoring African Forests
But Is Philanthropy the Way to Go? By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) — A coalition of climate philanthropies, governments, technical support providers and others, responding to an urgent call by African leaders for environmental funding, has pledged close to $2 billion to help protect carbon reserves and biodiversity.
A New Initiative Seeks to Transform Agriculture & Food Systems
By Bernhard Schell SHARM EL-SHEIKH (IDN) — The Egyptian Presidency of the UN Climate Conference COP27 has launched a new initiative Food and Agriculture for Sustainable Transformation or FAST, to improve the quantity and quality of climate finance contributions to transform agriculture and food systems by 2030. The cooperation programme will have concrete deliverables for […]
COP27: First official Food and Agriculture Pavilion
Putting agrifood systems transformation at the heart of the COP27 By Jaya Ramachandran ROME (IDN) — For the first time, the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), CGIAR and The Rockefeller Foundation will host the official Food and Agriculture Pavilion at the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27) taking place in Sharm El […]
WFP Starts Afresh in DR Congo’s Violence-Torn Northeast
By Benjamin Anguandia, WFP KINSHASA (IDN) — Kesereka, who prefers to go by Sadi, accepts a stack of cash from a World Food Programme (WFP) officer in a small room in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s northeastern town of Mabalako. He counts it carefully, folding it neatly, so it fits in his small pocket.
Zimbabwe: Growing Lettuce in Empty Plastic Bottles
By Farai Shawn Matiashe MUTARE, Zimbabwe (IDN) — Ruth Rugeje, 38, monitors plants of cabbages, a pale green leafy vegetable, grown in empty two-litre bottles in the backyard of her home in Mutapa, a high-density suburb in the central Zimbabwean city of Gweru. This innovative farmer picked these plastic bottles from the illegal dumping sites […]
Global Food Crisis: Cash Offers Hope to the World’s Most Vulnerable
By Edward Johnson | World Food Programme (WFP) Amid an unprecedented global hunger crisis, cash offers one vehicle to reach the world’s most vulnerable people in ways that can lift communities and economies. ROME (IDN) — While skyrocketing food prices have fallen recently, they still remain high, with the war in Ukraine driving up the […]
UN Chief Visits ‘Vessels of Hope’ Before returning to New York
By Radwan Jakeem NEW YORK (IDN) — UN Secretary-General António Guterres oversaw on August 20 the departure of two ships involved in the Black Sea Grain Initiative, a UN-brokered operation to bring urgently needed hunger relief to the Horn of Africa. Mr. Guterres flew into Istanbul on August 20 from Chisinau, Moldova—where he was hosted […]
Humanitarian Food Grain on way to Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) — A UN-chartered vessel has been loaded with humanitarian food grain for Africa, in a first step toward releasing much needed food aid that had been trapped in the Ukraine. The vessel will carry 23,000 tons of grain for Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya as part of […]