CFS 51 side event: Promoting energy access to safeguard food security and nutrition gains within agrifood systems and beyond
Energy is essential for food security and development. Lack of access to energy in many developing countries is a fundamental barrier to reducing hunger and ensuring that the world can produce enough food to meet future demand.
Food security and nutrition can be safeguarded by ensuring access to sustainable energy in all areas of agrifood systems. This ranges from energy for irrigation and agro-processing, to cold chains for transport and storage of safe, nutritious food, and clean cooking in households. Renewable energy offers the opportunity to address the challenge of decoupling fossil fuel use from food system energy needs, while advancing rural development and contributing to climate action, building on the food-water-energy nexus.
FAO's Energy Team, in collaboration with the World Food Programme (WFP), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), is organizing a side event at the upcoming CFS 51: "Promoting energy access to safeguard food security and nutrition gains within the agrifood systems and beyond", on 25 October 2023.
The event will explore different approaches, both from a global perspective and as exemplified with a number of country and regional case studies from Africa:
- sustainable energy for enhancing circular economy that positively impacts on food security and nutrition in West Africa;
- building and enhancing food security with centralized access to basic services through the Rapid Rural Transformation model; and
- renewable Energy for Agrifood Systems – examples from Rwanda.
Participants will need to register, and can join in person at FAO headquarters, Iran Room, or online via Zoom.