In a year and era where bright spots can seem few and far between, here’s one: There’s no question that food systems have moved to the center of climate change conversations.
This is evident as the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification’s annual summit closes this week in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where agrifood systems got their own dedicated day — just as we saw at the other two of the “Rio Trio” United Nations conventions: The biodiversity conference in Cali, Colombia, and the climate change conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, this fall.
The largest U.N. summit on desertification, or COP16, brought stark numbers: Some 1.2 billion people and 1.5 billion hectares are affected by land degradation (that’s 1.5 times the size of the United States), with another 100 million hectares decreasing each year, according to a report out last week. Degraded land is no longer usable for economic, agricultural, or biological purposes. And agriculture is the biggest culprit, accounting for some 80% of forest loss and 70% of freshwater use.
As we told you last week, it will cost $2.6 trillion annually by 2030 to restore the world’s productive land from degradation. The same amount is spent annually on environmentally harmful subsidies such as state support for synthetic fertilizers and monoculture crop production, UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw pointed out in Riyadh.
“We are talking about land and drought but what it means, really, is food and nutrition security. We are losing healthy soils as the productive side of food due to unsustainable agriculture. Yet we need to produce as much food as we produce today by mid-century to feed a growing population and middle class,” Thiaw told Devex contributor David Njagi in Riyadh.
COP16’s flagship Riyadh Action Agenda, released last week at the Agri-food System Day, brings together the goals of the land use, food systems, and water conservation communities to support UNCCD’s objectives by:
• Conserving and restoring 1.5 billion hectares of degraded land to achieve land degradation neutrality by 2030.
• Restoring 250 million hectares of degraded agricultural land by 2030 through regenerative and sustainable agrifood systems.
• Enhancing drought resilience by protecting 30% of land and inland water, which should benefit at least 500 million people.
• Mobilizing $2.1 trillion in support of those goals.
Just where that money will come from has been a key discussion point in Riyadh. Many have called for the alignment of domestic public budgets and private capital to restore degraded land and battle drought, along with subsidy reforms. The conference has emphasized the private sector’s role, as David reports. Last week, some 400 CEOs and high-level executives gathered at the COP16 Business 4 Land Forum to discuss how they might do their part.
“If in your business plan you have to abuse part of the planet, then you are not going to be able to do that for a very long time. The externality you create will come back and hit you,” says Swiss businessman André Hoffmann, founder of InTent, a group that engages the private sector in sustainable land management.
Read: COP16 urges private sector to restore degraded land and battle drought
Background: COP16 desertification summit to target private sector’s overuse of land
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Last week, COP16 also saw the launch of the Food Systems Integrated Program, or FSIP, a funding mechanism that will channel $282 million from the Global Environment Facility and an estimated $1.8 billion in partner co-financing into climate action through agrifood systems.
Led by the International Fund for Agriculture Development and the Food and Agriculture Organization, FSIP aims to promote sustainable and resilient crops, commodities, livestock, and aquaculture systems across 32 countries. It targets eight sectors: maize, rice, wheat, cocoa, palm oil, soy, livestock, and aquaculture.
“This is an example of how we can bring in many sectors, and each tailor to specific commodities and to specific countries,” IFAD President Alvaro Lario said at the launch in Riyadh. “So in Kenya, we’re talking about major livestock systems. Indonesia, deforestation, palm oil value chains. Ethiopia, cultural livestock. So it’s global goals. At the same time, they are government-led frameworks and they are solutions that are implemented at the community level.”
With less than three weeks left in the year, the global conference circuit is still going strong. This week, my colleague Jenny Lei Ravelo is in Osaka, Japan, for the annual Global Child Nutrition Forum, where she got hold of the highlights of the annual Global Survey of School Meal Programs. The full report is expected early next year.
Some 408.2 million of children from age 3 upward in 169 countries received food at school in 2022. This means school meals hold huge power to transform food systems in numerous ways, such as by boosting demand for nutritious and climate-friendly foods and strengthening livelihoods for anyone who grows, transports, or sells food.
Meanwhile, the rapid pace of global inflation means that the annual school meal budget per child has fallen in lower-income countries, from $35.7 per child in 2017 to $28.04 in 2022. Governments have been dealing with the shortfall by feeding fewer children, changing the meals they’re serving, or serving food fewer days per week, Heidi Kessler, deputy director of the Global Child Nutrition Foundation, tells Jenny.
Also among the findings: Higher-income countries may feed more children and offer more variety, but the meals aren’t necessarily healthier. And some countries are extremely reliant on external funding for their school meal programs, with 99% of Malawi’s $15.5 million annual school meal budget and 94% of Madagascar’s $69.5 million budget coming from international donors.
The United States’ McGovern-Dole Program is the world’s largest donor to school feeding programs, with 50 projects in 34 countries valued at over $1.1 billion. Some advocates are anxious about what will happen to the program during Donald Trump’s second presidential term. He tried to cut it during his first term, citing ineffective implementation.
So what’s to come? “That is the million-dollar question,” McGovern-Dole program director Lindsay Carter said in response to a question during a workshop in Osaka.
“While the top may change, you’ll still see us sitting here talking to you, and we are moving ahead with fiscal year 2025 as we speak, so we will keep on going,” she added.
Read: 5 things to know from the latest global survey of school meal programs
To wrap up, we have an early holiday present for any of you looking to build a career in agrifood systems or conservation. Devex’s Careers team talked to the experts and got their best advice.
First, know that there are a variety of entry points. And if a job proves elusive, consider volunteering to build up your technical and strategic skills.
Whether you’re already in the field or looking to break in, take a look at one emerging area: food science. Combining chemistry, biochemistry, nutrition, microbiology, and engineering, the sector looks to address challenges around what people eat to make diets more sustainable and reduce agrifood emissions.
Specifically interested in conservation work? Understand that it’s about more than saving animals and plants, and those efforts should be linked to broader efforts to improve life for our species, including efforts to reduce poverty and improve health. Happy job hunting!
Read more:
• Career advice from a food systems program office
• What development professionals need to know about working in food science
• Working in conservation: 3 things for development pros to know
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Chiefs of Party, USDA-funded McGovern-Dole programs
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Worldwide
A beloved food in Côte d’Ivoire — attiéké, which is made from fermented cassava flour — has been added to UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage. [BBC]
FAO seeks $1.9 billion in 2025 to provide emergency agricultural assistance to nearly 49 million people. [FAO]
David Njagi, Andrew Green, and Jenny Lei Ravelo contributed to this edition of Devex Dish.