News

The newsletter of the SDC Agriculture & Food Systems Network provides you with the latest news on projects, publications and events related to food systems and submitted by network members. It also informs about A&FS Network activities and portrays network members.

Split gill mushroom, or kanglayen in Manipuri, is a key ingredient of mouth-watering delicacies such as kanglayen paknam (flat spicy baked dish), kanglayen eromba (with fermented fish and other ingredients) or simply fried on its own as kanghou. Deforestation, climate change, and rapid urbanisation are making it hard to forage for this mushroom in the wild. Puina Sukham, a young AgriEntrepreneur based in Manipur, is addressing this scarcity by developing an innovative solution to growing the mushroom in simple controlled chambers.

Livestock production is more than just producing meat, milk and eggs. It plays multiple roles and holds an intricate position in food systems. Pathways to address livestock issues need to be context-specific and multifaceted, trade-offs are inevitable. A recently published discussion paper by the Swiss national FAO-Committee, a multistakeholder consultative body nominated by the Swiss Federal Council, discusses the livestock sector as integral part of food systems transformation and proposed a set of recommendations at global and national level.

An international training course on organic cacao production in diversified agroforestry systems took place at the beginning of April in Bolivia. The two-week course, organized by FiBL Switzerland together with Bolivian partners, shared experiences and research findings from the project “Long-term farming systems comparisons in the tropics (SysCom) Bolivia" and fostered discussions on sustainable agricultural practices.

Facing increasing requests to deploy Food security / Food systems / Nutrition experts, the Swiss Humanitarian Aid Unit (SHA) wishes to strengthen its response capacity.

The GRFC is the reference document for a comprehensive analysis of global, regional and country-level acute food insecurity.

These twenty one case studies have been collected from nine African countries and India. From the most hostile environments of the Sahel (Niger) to equatorial wetlands (Gabon), saline soils (Tanzania) and oases (Tunisia), the authors show us how farmers’ varieties meet the nutritional and economic needs of populations in traditional, agroecological production systems.

The aim of this new FAO report is to improve the understanding of how climate change affects the livelihoods and economic behaviour of vulnerable rural populations. It brings together an impressive array of data from 24 low- and middle-income countries in five regions of the world.

This FAO report emphasizes existing efforts and climate commitments, detailing an integrated approach for a just transition, outlining food security, nutrition objectives, and their emission implications. Additionally, it introduces ten domains of actions, and 20 key milestones. The report is the first of three reports to be published by FAO until 2025.

The 2023 edition of The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report presents updates on the food security and nutrition situation around the world including the latest estimates of the cost and affordability of a healthy diet.