Devex Dish (Devex Newsletter) published a roundup of interesting topics and quotations from experts. Senior research fellow James Thurlow was quoted. He said, “Agrifood system investments are an investment in poverty reduction and long-term economic development, and so we shouldn’t bypass them in order to build back better.” Devex Dish also reported on findings from the book, COVID-19 & Global Food Security: Two Years Later. As the death toll from COVID-19 passes 6 million people and we come up on two full years of the pandemic, Thurlow argued during a press briefing that some pandemic recovery efforts have been misguided, focusing too heavily on urban areas and large businesses rather than rural areas and farms. In a report released this week from IFPRI, researchers including Thurlow examine what we’ve learned about food security from the pandemic and what still needs to be done to ensure food systems are resilient to future shocks.
