Each week, Food Tank is rounding up a few news stories that inspire excitement, infuriation, or curiosity.
U.N. Conference on Drought and Desertification Begins
The 17th session of the Conference of the Parties to the U.N. Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) kicked off this week, where decision makers are gathering in Mongolia to tackle drought and land degradation.
WWF calls drought, which dries soils and makes farming more uncertain, “one of the clearest ways people feel climate change.” Today, land degradation and drought are estimated to cost the global economy nearly US$900 billion every year, affecting up to 40 per cent of the world’s land and 3.2 billion people, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.
During the conference, governments, investors, businesses, scientists, and civil society organizations will discuss solutions to restore lands.
A major focus at this year’s Conference is to allocate the US$12 billion that was pledged by countries and institutions under the Riyadh Global Drought Resilience Partnership two years ago at COP16. The funds are intended to help 74 countries stricken by drought and land degradation. Although there’s still a long way to go to secure the finance needed—an estimated $2.6 trillion by 2030 according to the UNCCD—to restore the world’s lands, it’s a welcome step in the right direction.
Yasmine Fouad, Executive Secretary of the UNCCD, also reports that more than 70 countries submitted their drought management plans, which now need to be converted into projects for implementation.
NGOs Mobilize to Help Earthquake Victims
Humanitarian organizations are stepping in to help communities recover following major earthquakes in Colombia and Indonesia.
The earthquake in Western Colombia—one of the largest the country has seen in years—has resulted in around 300 deaths, more than 4,000 injuries, and the destruction of over 26,000 homes. And in Indonesia, just days before independence day celebrations, a major earthquake struck the island of Flores. More than 60 people have died and around 5,000 people have been displaced from their homes. Landslides have made it harder to deliver much-needed aid as fears of starvation grow.
The United Nations announced it is scaling up humanitarian assistance in Colombia to reach those affected by the disaster. Done directly to the World Food Programme’s efforts clicking HERE. And World Central Kitchen is on the ground in Colombia and Indonesia, working to serve meals to people in need as quickly as possible. Support their work at wck.org.
Women Fishers in sub-Saharan Africa Cut Post-Harvest Losses
In parts of sub-Saharan Africa, many women fishers face limited access to the technology, storage facilities, processing equipment, and business training. This leads to higher post-harvest losses compared to their male counterparts and leaves them with lower quality products and reduced incomes. WorldFish wants to change that.
In Tanzania, for example, the research center is helping seaweed farmers and entrepreneurs connect with equipment to develop products that can be sold for more than raw seaweed. Women are also receiving training on certification, marketing, and business management. And along the coast of Kenya, new solar-powered freezers are helping fishers reduce spoilage, giving women more flexibility over when they sell their product.
“The seaweed milling machine has saved me time and money,” says Tanzanian seaweed processor and trader Rehema Mkweka. “I can now process my seaweed close to home and produce higher-value products.”
New Resource Helps Decision Makers Target Crops for Investment
The new Priority List from the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) is helping decision makers identify the crops that are most worth investing in.
GAIN’s resource uses a holistic system to analyze nearly 800 locally available foods in low- and middle-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and Latin America. The assessment will help decision makers identify the most nutritious ones to support through programs and policies. Many of the top scorers from GAIN’s list are traditional foods with particularly high nutrient density, such as the African star apple and amaranth leaves.
GAIN also offers two complementary tools to ensure the Priority List has the greatest possible impact. One allows users to compare foods to understand how they’ll perform when matched with a particular program or policy goal. The second compares nutritional value with environmental impact, focusing on food systems in three countries: Indonesia, Kenya, and Rwanda.
California Begins Phasing Out Paraquat
The state of California is beginning to phase out the use of paraquat, a weedkiller linked to Parkinson’s disease, thyroid disease, childhood leukemia, non-Hodgkin lymphoma and birth defects.
The California Department of Pesticide Regulation announced that all manufacturers of pesticide products containing the active ingredient paraquat have voluntarily cancelled their product registrations, which allow them to sell the chemical in the state.
The move sends “a powerful message that there is no place for paraquat in modern agriculture,” says Bernadette Del Chiaro, Environmental Working Group’s Senior Vice President for California.
The last companies to cancel their registrations now have two years before they must stop selling paraquat-based products.
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Photo courtesy of Jame Baltz, Unsplash
