Blog

In Rwanda, relatively few households consume eggs — even though eggs offer a range of nutritional benefits, especially for children and pregnant and lactating women.

FES Vice President Roberta Lauretti-Bernhard participated in the the Specialty Coffee Association EXPO (SCA) in Chicago April 10 -14. FES & Joe Coffee Company  co-hosted a lecture on "Gender Equity in 2024: Women in the Global Coffee Value Chain". The event was developed by Roberta, Amaris Gutierrez-Ray from Joe Coffee and Karen Cebreros, founder of Elan Organic Coffee and co-founder of the Int’l Women in Coffee Alliance (IWCA).

Introduction

In rapid response to the abrupt trade disruptions resulting from Russia’s blockade of the Black Sea—a tactic in its war on Ukraine, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) launched the Agriculture Resilience Initiative (AGRI)-Ukraine. AGRI-Ukraine is critical to supporting Ukraine’s export and agricultural sector needs, which are expected to remain vulnerable to the Russian Federation’s aggression in the months and years to come.

Revolutionizing Drug Development with AI TechnologyThe advent of AI technology has revolutionized several sectors, one of which is drug development and validation. The potential of AI technology in informing the processes such as the development of antibodies and optimizing molecules is progressively substantial. AI technology has made it easier, faster, and more accurate to train models, validate antibodies, and optimize molecules for drug development.

This blogpost is one in a series of blogs sharing insights gained from the Market Systems Symposium 2023. The MSS blogpost provides a brief snapshot of key insights shared across a number of different sessions in MSS 2023 held in Cape Town between 13-15 November 2023.

The blog provides a summary of how MSR analysis can provide important insights into local contexts that should shape how activities are designed and implemented. The case of Haiti is of particular interest in that the various forces and factors affecting how smallholders manage risks from shocks and stresses have had a profound effect on how they engage market systems. As the authors explain, the MSR analysis provided insights into how smallholders manage a portfolio of animals to cope with such a dynamic and uncertain context.

The blog highlights the critically important learning function that in many parts of international development are quite weak. The blog provides an example of how practitioners in the area of employment and labor markets have realized the importance of learning and sharing across projects, countries, donors, etc. to accelerate the learning related to complex labor related challenges. While the blog does not focus on the importance of taking systems lenses, it is useful to note that systems thinking is a foundational element of the community of practice.

Climate change has been a slow-moving risk for some time now, but what is often missed, which this blog points out, is that there are immediate consequences affecting most people around the world, especially the most vulnerable. As the blog highlights, increasing weather variability is a challenge for most smallholder farmers, including in Uganda. At the same time, the ability to effectively forecast weather has remained low, which creates a circumstance of increasing risks since erratic weather patterns mean farmers are often caught off guard damaging crops and reducing productivity.

If you’ve ever tried to evaluate the extent of system change, you know it’s a fascinating—but tricky—process.

In the second blog in the series, the authors focus on the importance of using a retail distribution market systems lens to gain insights into the business realities of selling construction products and services to low-income customer segments. For example, low-income customers buy in smaller lots and often have important considerations related to decision-making, coping strategies, and trust that require specific business strategies and tactics. The blog examines a few examples from TCIS’s work in relation to how they applied systemic thinking related to retail distribution to improve housing outcomes for incremental builders.

This blog is written by Laura Kim and Michelle LeMeur of the Canopy Lab for the Feed the Future Market Systems and Partnership (MSP) Activity. How does one know if their studies have had any influence in the real world? With the COVID-19 pandemic in the rearview mirror (for many), we set out to answer this question following the dissemination of our 2021 and 2022 studies on the impact and implications of the pandemic on the global development workforce.

How Feed the Future Business Drivers for Food Safety is building capacity for small- and medium-sized food businesses to be leaders in food loss solutions

What does protecting watersheds have to do with the coffee market system? Surprisingly, a lot! Since 2014, Catholic Relief Services’ (CRS) Blue Harvest Program has worked with local partners in Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua to restore water resources and transform coffee livelihoods. The mountainous, coffee-producing areas of Central America provide drinking water for millions of people. As land degradation and climate change threaten coffee production and contribute to growing water scarcity, the link between the coffee market system and natural resource management has never been more important.

Triumvirate’s product is simple but innovative: it’s a supplement made from locally sourced fish that adds nutrients to family meals.

Is it possible to reintroduce a crop with a compelling global value in a nation with substantial land degradation and little institutional crop memory? Yes, it’s possible. But only with a strategic approach to market systems development (MSD). With local partners CLUSA El Salvador, Acugolfo and Caritas, Catholic Relief Services (CRS) has been working since 2014 to resuscitate El Salvador’s cacao sector through the Alianza Cacao project. Alianza Cacao aims to turn El Salvador into a key exporter and place of origin for high-quality, aromatic, fine-flavor cacao by stimulating production of an estimated 4,500 metric tons of Salvadoran cacao worth approximately $20,000,000 over the life of the project.

In early June, I had the opportunity to see how the United States has used trade to advance gender equality while on an interagency delegation with senior officials from the Department of State, Department of Labor, and U.S. Trade Representative’s Office (USTR).

Why food safety? In a world plagued by persistent hunger, undernourishment and malnutrition, food safety plays a key role in addressing such issues. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that unsafe food causes 600 million cases (nearly 1 in 10 people) of foodborne diseases and 420,000 deaths annually. Most of the global burden of foodborne disease falls on those living in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), comprising 75 percent of deaths from foodborne illness, despite comprising only 41 percent of the global population.

With more than half of Hondurans younger than 25 and the majority of the population living below the poverty line, young people need access to employment opportunities. Yet, too many Honduran young women and men face dismal economic prospects with 27 percent of youth not in education, employment or training. Compounded by the impacts of climate change and food insecurity, those who cannot find jobs are at risk of falling further into poverty or migrating elsewhere in search of opportunities.

To foster consumer demand and food safety confidence in food supply chains, numerous international trade organizations now require sanitary and phytosanitary systems (SPS) to be maintained at the highest standards. Smallholder farmers, farmer organizations, buyers and governments of low and middle-income countries are expected to meet these phytosanitary standards or risk export shipment rejections. With a growing need to have safe, quality food, it is critical to adhere to food safety standards of buyers and regulatory bodies.

The Linkage Between Food Safety and Sustainability Food loss and waste pose a major threat to both global food system security and sustainability. Postharvest loss is both nutrient and resource loss. When food is wasted, so are the resources required to produce it, namely land, water, and energy. In Africa, with the world’s highest rates of hunger and malnutrition, about a third of all food produced is lost before it ever reaches consumers.

Corruption is increasingly seen as the very “operating system” of many developing country governments, and is connected to sophisticated networks that cross sectoral and national boundaries in their drive to maximize returns for their members. Indeed, independent studies suggest that corruption is woven into the fabric of governing institutions due to kleptocrats’ ability to co-opt or disable independent authorities, promote willful blindness, competing incentives, or inattention.

This blog is co-authored by Komal Bazaz Smith, Program Director of USAID Digital Connectivity & Cybersecurity Partnership Programs and Anthony Brown, Co-Founder, Acute Incite

This blog is jointly authored by Wilson Wakawa, Intervention Lead – Livestock Productivity of the Rural Resilience Activity, Nurein Abdulafattah Shittu, Advisor, Peace and Conflict at the Rural Resilience Activity and John Rachkara, Deputy Chief of Party of the Rural Resilience Activity.

This blog is authored by John Rachkara, Deputy Chief of Party of the Rural Resilience Activity, John Daudu Ebile, Senior MIS/T4D Officer of the Rural Resilience Activity.