Achieving a sustainable agricultural system requires an effective assessment of economic, environmental, and social conditions. Existing research has mainly focused on a single sector and lacks critical comparisons of determinants and trade-offs between sustainability dimensions. This study adopts a cross-sectoral perspective to assess and compare the sustainability performance of fruit...

The Global Environment Facility (GEF) is the financial backbone of multilateral environmental agreements for a "healthy planet and healthy people". Agriculture, with its substantial carbon and ecological footprint, holds immense potential for transformation. Small-scale farms contribute to agrobiodiversity, carbon sequestration and sustainable land management, forming the bedrock for a harmonious...

The understanding of the role of using forest resources in the livelihood strategies of smallholder farmers is limited. Rural household surveys often omit this aspect. From a survey of 600 Indonesian cattle farmers, we apply the sustainable livelihood framework to investigate the role extracting forest resources has in livelihood strategies...

Agroecology Newsletter of January 2023

Significant detrimental effects of agricultural intensification and specialization are becoming increasingly evident. Reliance on monocultures, few varieties, and intensive use of agrochemicals is a major factor in climate change, biodiversity decline, soil health deterioration, and pollution, putting our food system at risk. This requires sustainable agricultural processes, such as crop...

Both climate change and biodiversity loss have distorting social and economic impacts on development and cause severe risks for food security, nutrition and livelihoods among rural populations in Europe and Central Asia, most of whom depend directly or indirectly on the agricultural sector. The mutually reinforcing and complex nature of...

Formed in 2007, Food Plant Solutions Rotary Action Group (FPS) creates science-based educational materials, which: identify highly nutritious local food plants, explain how to grow them in a sustainable, agroecological way, detail the nutritional value of the plants and describe why human bodies require those nutrients. The resources created by FPS allows people to better...

This evaluation examines the effects of compensatory payments for organic production in Sweden on rural development, the environment and climate.  This evaluation from Sweden evaluated the compensation for organic production in the country’s Rural Development Programme and revealed a positive impact on farmers' profitability, competitiveness, local economies and innovation. It also...

The Central Asian Animal Health Network (CAAHN) convened on 8−9 June for its third meeting since its establishment in 2019 in the historical city of Samarkand, Uzbekistan, to delve into the future of animal health and the One Health approach within the region. Organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization...

Oceans cover 70 per cent of the world’s surface and contain 80 per cent of all life (UN, 2022). 40 per cent of the population live 100km from the coast and the ocean provides 3.1 billion of them with their primary source of protein (UN, 2017). Marine food systems, however,...

Le CFSI, la Fondation de France et le Roppa, qui portent ensemble le programme de Promotion de l'agriculture familiale en Afrique de l'Ouest (Pafao), présentent un travail collectif intitulé Solutions ouest-africaines pour des systèmes alimentaires durables, sous la forme d'une publication écrite et d'un podcast. Ce sont les agriculteurs familiaux...

Rice is a crop that contributes significantly both to food security and to ensure adequate income levels for farmers. This motivates efforts in many countries to disseminate techniques that increase production while being environmentally friendly and affordable to small farmers. The objective of this article is to study the process...

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Pacific Community (SPC) have pledged to collaborate on a ten-year plan, the Pacific Strategic Plan for Agriculture and Fisheries Statistics (P-SPAFS) which aims at strengthening the collection and dissemination of statistics related to food security, agriculture, fisheries, and...

Following the events organised in July and December 2022 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, the United Nations has adopted the first Resolution on promoting the social and solidarity economy for sustainable development during the General Assembly held today 18th April 2023. As an observer of the UN Task Force on the Social and...

Over the last few weeks, South-east Asia has been the focus of FAO’s work targeting the achievement of gender equality in small-scale fisheries. As part of the project “Implementing the Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines for gender equitable and climate resilient food systems and livelihoods”, the Philippines and Indonesia had the opportunity to hold two different...

Starting from the observation that value chain research has informed much of agricultural development interventions in recent decades, this paper identifies five key challenges to current agricultural development policies in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs): access to finance, infrastructure, land tenure, local linkages and knowledge transfer. Based on this review,...

In response to the sustainability issues that agriculture faces in advanced economies, agroecology has gained increasing relevance in scientific, political, and social debates. This has promoted discussion about transitions to agroecology, which represents a significant advancement. Accordingly, it has become a growing field of research. We reviewed the literature on...

✔Rural Realities | Testing Grounds for Wellbeing ✔Are We Ready to Amend the CAP SP to Fit For 55? ✔The Michael Dower Award for European Rural Resilience And much, much more in our Weekly Briefing

Harvest and clean the fruits, and slice them longitudinally. Crush the fruit sections into a mixture of pulp, seeds, and juice. Subsequently pour the mixture into a large container where it ferments for a period usually lasting three days. For acid extraction, apply an equal volume solution of hydrochloric acid...

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in collaboration with the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources Development of the Republic of Kiribati, will hold an inception and upgrading strategy workshop on 4-5 July in Tarawa. Although the project started in 2020, this official national launch event was hampered...