Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The impacts of a strengthening El Niño and the war in Iran highlight in the Greater Horn of Africa, an area already beset by prolonged crisis and conflict, factors that are combining with others to potentially create a major, multicountry polycrisis.
While Europe has banned hazardous pesticides, the same chemicals are exported to African countries such as Uganda, where farmers often apply them with minimal protection and without legal recourse. ESAFF Uganda and its partners are challenging the EU and demanding change.
Understanding how food is produced can help consumers make choices that support healthier soil, water, pollinators, and communities.
Oklahoma restricts oil field wastewater injection within a half-mile of public water wells to protect against pollution. Regulators have let companies do it anyway. Officials are taking on the oil industry by calling for additional protections against oil field wastewater injection.
The impression that we can eat what we want fits neatly with a neoliberal story that treats capitalism as democratic, where people “vote with their wallets”. But this is an illusion. Rather than putting our faith in green consumerism to rebuild food systems, we should strive to de‑commodify food.
Farmer organisations should stop selling agriculture as just another industry and instead reclaim it as a mission rooted in land stewardship and care for animals and ecosystems. But with many farmers locked into debt and infrastructure that bind them to the current model, meaningful change can’t rest on farmers alone, the responsibility rests with society at large.
Resilient, self-reliant food systems. A new IPES-Food report says they’re key to addressing food price volatility amid rising geopolitical tensions.
Rising energy and fertiliser prices linked to the conflict in the Middle East are increasing the risk of global food insecurity, prompting renewed questions about how to strengthen food security and reduce dependence on fragile global supply chains.
Small farms rarely make a decent living in commodity markets. It’s time to stop chasing scale and start building resilient, relationship-based food systems instead.
Architect and farmer Caitlin Taylor says communities need regional infrastructure for food security. As global agribusiness corporations contribute to ecological degradation and threaten the viability of local farms, she’s working to build a different system.
Intense floods in Algeria’s Sahara in 2024 exposed how modern desert cities shed water instead of storing it. Redesigning infrastructure to hold rain, not rush it away, could help turn arid regions into resilient, living landscapes.
In the remote Tughgoz village in Tajikistan, agriculture is the foundation of daily life. Local seed varieties that once thrived have become rare, so residents launched a community-supported seed initiative to preserve and share traditional seeds before they disappear.
