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For weeks we’ve been hearing that the Trump administration will soon announce a transfer of all funding and responsibilities for Food for Peace, the United States’ flagship food aid program, from the State Department to the Department of Agriculture, or USDA, via a backdoor interagency agreement. So far official details are scarce. But behind the scenes, food security advocates and U.S. lawmakers are kicking up a fuss.
On Friday, that opposition came in the form of a letter from Democratic members of Congress to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins, and Acting Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development Russell Vought. It gives insight into lawmakers’ concerns as well as the means by which the transfer is expected to happen — namely, without the approval of Congress and before the completion of a required assessment of moving the program.
“Following the Trump Administration’s reckless dismantling of USAID earlier this year, the State Department hired many former [USAID] Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance staff with expertise in food security and humanitarian logistics to work for the State Department’s Office of Global Food Security, presumably in part to carry out continued implementation of [Food for Peace]. We are alarmed by reports that these staff have not been consulted by … State and USDA leadership,” the letter states. Signatories include Rep. Gregory Meeks, the ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Rep. Lois Frankel, the ranking member on the House Appropriations Subcommittee on National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs, along with other members of their committees.
They also write that no one has consulted former USAID staff about a planned redesign that would substantially change the program to focus solely on the purchase and shipping of U.S. agricultural commodities abroad, without funding to help countries distribute them to people in need. Without these resources, Food for Peace would become a “dumping program disconnected from the strategic objective of feeding those most food insecure,” according to the letter. There are also concerns that USDA, which represents American farmers, doesn’t have the expertise or personnel to carry out such a massive humanitarian initiative.
Started seven decades ago, Food for Peace has been the world’s largest food aid program. In 2023, it provided around $2 billion of assistance and reached tens of millions of people facing hunger worldwide with American-grown food commodities, cash transfers, and other forms of nutrition assistance. As the Trump administration has taken a wrecking ball to U.S. foreign aid, it has shown it wants to keep in-kind emergency food assistance that benefits American farmers while getting rid of programs that help communities wean themselves off of aid.
Within the past three weeks, organizations implementing programs to build resilience in chronically food-insecure regions — a small but critical part of Food for Peace — have been informed they’d be losing their funding, my colleague Elissa Miolene scoops. These programs are formally called “resilience food security activities,” also known as nonemergency food aid. They encompass nutrition education programs, agricultural training, and strengthening of local markets. Up to eight organizations — including Save the Children and Mercy Corps — will see those programs end.
“For us, the beauty of Food for Peace has always been that the bulk of it is taking care of emergency needs — and that’s for people that need food now,” says Emily Byers, managing director of global development policy at Save the Children US. “But it also recognizes that the most effective way to deal with emergencies is to stop them before they happen, so it invested a small part of Food for Peace resources in getting communities to the point where they wouldn’t need emergency assistance anymore.”
“What is the long-term strategy here, if we’re cutting out any of the preventive part?” she adds.
Read the scoop: State Department ends support for some food security programs
Opinion: The US is breaking a lifesaving global food aid system
See also: A successful US food aid program needs agriculture investment, experts say (Pro)
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U.S. food aid might be on the decline, but a new agreement between the U.S. and Kenya signals what may replace some of it. Last week, Kenyan President William Ruto announced his country had signed a deal with the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation for a $1 billion debt-for-food swap. The innovative arrangement allows Kenya to reduce part of its external debt in exchange for committing the freed-up money to food and nutrition programs, my colleague Ayenat Mersie writes.
“We … appreciate DFC for agreeing to proceed with the $1 billion debt-for-food security swap to allow us to replace costly existing debt with lower-cost financing,” Ruto wrote on the social media platform X. With more than $41.8 billion in external debt, Kenya is one of Africa’s most heavily indebted countries and spends roughly one-third of its government revenue on interest payments alone.
In recent years, debt-for-development swaps have emerged as a critical tool to redirect limited resources into priority areas. For instance, several countries have carried out debt-for-nature swaps that offer lower interest rates in return for nature protection. And debt-for-food swaps are not entirely new: Several countries have used them to redirect bilateral debt payments into school meal programs. The World Food Programme has taken the lead in such deals in Egypt, Madagascar, Pakistan, and elsewhere. Since 2007, at least $145 million worth of countries’ debt has been channeled into WFP programs, improving nutrition outcomes and school participation.
Read: Kenya lands $1B debt-for-food swap with US DFC
• Climate change-induced extreme weather has cost the world some $143 billion in annual losses over the past two decades.
• More than 3 billion people are affected by degraded land.
• Around 1 million of the planet’s 8 million species face extinction.
Those are some of the sobering numbers from the latest Global Environment Outlook, which was produced by 287 scientists for the United Nations Environment Programme. It comes as environment ministers gather in Nairobi, Kenya, this week for the seventh United Nations Environment Assembly, or UNEA-7, the world’s highest decision-making body on environmental issues.
“It doesn't matter whether it's climate change, loss of biodiversity, land degradation, or pollution. They're all undermining our economy. They're also development issues; they're all undermining poverty alleviation. They're social issues; they're all undermining food security, water security, human health. They’re also security issues. They're leading to conflict in many parts of the world,” says the report’s co-chair Robert Watson, who is also the former chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Land degradation is projected to continue unabated, with the world losing fertile ground equivalent to the size of Ethiopia each year — and climate impacts could reduce per-person food availability more than 3% by mid-century. Still, the costs of action are much less than the costs of inaction in the long term: Whole-of-society changes, including in the way we grow and distribute food, could deliver benefits of up to $20 trillion per year by 2070 and keep growing, the report says.
The over 1,200-page report — which comes out every six or seven years — typically includes a summary of key conclusions and recommendations for policymakers that is agreed by governments. But this year’s report did not. Countries including the United States, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Turkey, and Argentina objected to references to fossil fuels, reducing meat in diets, plastics, and other issues, blocking agreement — as scientists refused to change their findings.
Among the issues being negotiated at UNEA-7, which opened Monday, are resolutions on saving the world’s glaciers, reining in massive seaweed blooms, reducing the environmental impact of AI, and critical minerals.
Read: UN Environment Programme warns world is off course as cooperation falters
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Welcome to the “Love Shack.” That’s the nickname of a special hut on the roof of the Madagascar Biodiversity Center where black soldier flies mate. These insects’ larvae are rich in proteins and lipids, and a growing cohort of research and development experts think they hold the key to reducing malnutrition, easing pressure on forests, and improving access to affordable organic fertilizers. They can also be eaten by humans.
“It’s a magical insect” with “amazing properties,” Tanjona Ramiadantsoa, the center’s scientific director, told my colleague Sara Jerving when she visited. “It ticks almost all the boxes.”
The center and its partners are training Madagascar’s smallholder farmers to start rearing these nutrient-dense larvae. While they’re not a perfect replacement for livestock, the carbon emissions expended in farming black soldier flies per unit of protein are much lower than that of cattle, sheep, and goats — and require much less water. The flies consume organic residue, which is cheaper and more environmentally friendly than feed for poultry and livestock. Finally, the waste from raising them can be used as organic fertilizer. “It's almost a nice, perfect circular economy,” Ramiadantsoa said. “It’s an amazing solution for Madagascar.”
Read: Can a ‘magical’ insect help Madagascar battle malnutrition and deforestation?
From our archives: Insects — from exotic to essential food against malnutrition?
Google’s Flood Hub is using AI to deliver flood warnings and unconditional cash to farmers before disaster strikes. [Rest of World]
Child deaths rise in historic reversal, Gates Foundation reveals. [Devex]
A new report warns that widespread synthetic chemicals used across the global food system are driving major health and environmental harms costing up to $2.2 trillion a year and contributing to rising rates of cancer, infertility, and other diseases. [The Guardian]