Event Post

Bridging science and policy for effective humanitarian action.

Building equity into food systems.

Meeting challenges of the coming growing season and beyond in South America.

Creative policy solutions to difficult problems.

Collaborating to make food systems more inclusive.

Surfacing the most promising innovations.

Key elements to growth.

Tools for understanding global trends.

Country experiences show the way forward.

Assessing impacts of war and resilience strategies.

Assessing impacts of war and resilience strategies.

Research on gender and women’s empowerment in food systems and global development is central to IFPRI’s mission. Here we mark International Women’s Day (March 8)—with the theme “Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress”—with an account of our continuing efforts to develop and deploy metrics on women’s empowerment in agriculture. The 2015 adoption of Sustainable Development Goal […]

Examining a promising avenue for development programs.

Building resilience by diversifying risk.

Soda taxes and warning labels produce results.

Ongoing market disruptions hit vulnerable populations.

Navigating policy challenges to feed a hungry planet.

Overcoming challenges to helping smallholders.

Encouraging scientific understanding for sustainability.

Ways to scale innovations for sustainability and resilience.

Navigating the complexities of diet and nutrition solutions.

Identifying optimal paths for transformation.

Stakeholders grapple with rapid change.

New insights into developing country impacts.

A region key to feeding the world faces an era of global crisis.

A region key to feeding the world faces an era of global crisis.

Evolving rules on farm subsidies.

Ways to feed the world and meet Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for carbon reductions.

An expanding toolkit for assessing key gender issues in development projects.

Launching an Innovation Sprint on Gender and Climate Action.

Promoting a sustainable and inclusive food, agriculture, and trade transformation.

A better understanding of changing gender dynamics in agriculture and beyond.

Innovations and other efforts to maximize food preservation from farm to fork.

Effects continue to reverberate around the world and in individual countries.

Key takeaways from the recent event organized by IFPRI South Asia and Research and Information System for Developing Countries.

How can we transform agrifood systems to be sustainable, inclusive, and resilient for a more food-secure future?

Revisiting a key policy debate in light of high food prices.

Prospects for addressing climate change, food system transformation, and other issues.

Approaches to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other problems.

Making markets work for the poor.

Prospects for fostering mitigation, adaptation, and resilience.

Prospects for fostering mitigation, adaptation, and resilience.

Economic programming policies to drive the violence prevention agenda.

Tracking how food and nutrition organizations are doing on internal diversity and inclusion.

Approaches to climate adaptation in a vulnerable region.

Innovations to address current hardships and speed food system transformation.

Countries grapple with high food prices and persistent hunger and malnutrition.

Addressing growing risks from climate change, conflict, and other problems.

Accelerating policies and investments to contend with shocks and build resilience.

Addressing a humanitarian disaster without borders.

The Food Prices for Nutrition project provides new food security indicators.

Strategies for China’s agricultural transformation.

Southeast Asian countries pursue greater regional integration.

An important tool for managing food policy in a time of crisis.

Working to improve trade and agrifood systems.

The importance of research partnerships.

Modeling shows the promise of ag-tech innovation, opening trade, and other changes.

The importance of bringing innovations to low-income countries.

An essential tool in assessing gender disparities driven by COVID-19, climate change, and other factors.

Building capacity to weather climate, pandemic, and economic shocks.

Innovative approaches to solving the problems of food insecurity.

Fostering a paradigm shift for smallholders.

Addressing the recent rise in trade-distorting policies.

Implementando políticas para superar la pandemia en lo inmediato, y mirando al futuro.

Amid global economic uncertainty, better trade rules can faciliate food system transformation.

Innovations to build reslience.

The common prosperity policy offers opportunities to reduce poverty and boost human capital.

Prospects for a new continental free trade agreement, as charted by the 2021 Africa Agriculture Trade Monitor.

Mapping a path to progress amid pandemic and climate impacts.

The need for more and better-targeted funding to address looming challenges.

Maximizing the potential of a new continent-wide free trade agreement.

Evidence from Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda, and India and Nepal.

Contending with successive pandemic waves.

Food systems are both drivers of climate change and subject to its many impacts.

A crucial resource for improving food security, nutrition, and long-term prosperity.

Supporting food system transformation by redirecting farm subsidies that can reduce carbon footprints, boost resilience, improve food & nutrition security, and enhance poverty reduction & equity. 

Better management of shared natural resources can boost food system transformation.

More than 155 million people experienced acute food insecurity in 2020, an increase of 20 million from 2019 and a five-year high.

Bringing new technologies to smallholders is key to food system transformation.

Pondering the future of China's and the world's agrifood systems.

Building resilience and fostering sustainable growth post-pandemic.

Plotting a course for post-pandemic innovations—a discussion organized with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Netherlands Food Partnership.

For the first time, gender equality is a central focus of a major international summit.

Lessons for building resilience to ride out future shocks.

A new tool now available for Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and Yemen.

Exploring what works, and what doesn't, to promote health and nutrition.

Some reasons for optimism on food system innovation.

Addressing a growing problem for low-income countries.

Strategies for women's empowerment.

Seizing opportunity from the jaws of the COVID-19 crisis.

Assessing the new pact's diverse potential impacts on incomes and economies.

Better data collection is crucial for understanding an important source of employment and income.

COVID-19 and other challenges to regional food security.

How agriculture and food value chains are weathering the pandemic.

Boosting production of cereals and high-value food products can improve rural livelihoods.

The COVID-19 pandemic puts renewed focus on price monitoring tools.

Despite economic growth, agricultural transformation lags.

COVID-19 presents new challenges for the continent.

The pandemic disrupts country budgets, programs, and planning.

New pressures from COVID-19, the African Continental Free Trade Area, and other issues.

Rural areas lag in China's ongoing economic transformation.

New challenges for programs and research efforts that reach hundreds of millions of farmers.

Donors and developing countries must boost spending to improve food security, support smallholders, and blunt climate impacts.

COVID-19 is among a number of current stresses on the country's food system and social safety net.

Confronting global challenges upended by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pandemic poses new challenges for sustainable agriculture, sanitation, and other issues.

How governments and businesses across the continent are dealing with pandemic disruptions.

New research on how Myanmar, Nigeria, and Sudan are weathering the crisis.

Climate change, development, and other forces contribute to the threat of future pandemics.

A new IFPRI book explores the pandemic's unfolding impacts on poverty and other issues.

Innovations help supply chains adapt to disruptions.

China's experience provides a wake-up call for the global food system. 

The European Green deal's implications for building food security.

The effort to reach Zero Hunger faces new headwinds.

Lessons from a decades-long effort in global food security policy building.

The moral imperative of impoving food value chains.

Facing a perfect storm for nutrition.

The pandemic has led to one of the largest social protection scale-up efforts in modern history.

The pandemic poses new challenges for women's empowerment efforts.

The COVID-19 crisis could set back efforts to eliminate micronutrient malnutrition—but it doesn't have to.

Implementando políticas para superar la pandemia en lo inmediato, y mirando al futuro.

Navigating innovation amid a global pandemic.

Insights from the GFPR's inclusive food systems theme in light of the COVID-19 crisis. Co-organized with the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Confronting new challenges to progress on a key Sustainable Development Goal.

Falling incomes may lead to rising poverty, food insecurity, and gender inequity.

IFPRI's retiring Africa director reflects on 30 years of development work.

IFPRI findings show the pandemic's impacts are falling heavily on the poor around the world.

As the COVID-19 pandemic increasingly upends economies, efforts to improve food systems must continue.

Implications of a new free trade zone incorporating 774 million people and $21 trillion in GDP.

Researchers and policy makers must collaborate to implement a national strategic plan.

Why addressing micronutrient deficiency must cut across diverse sectors and policies – a discussion.

A new tool will put country-level data at the fingertips of policy makers.

Outlining ambitious programs to transform the food system and reach carbon neutrality.

Development lessons from a surprising aquaculture boom.

Preventing postharvest losses through improved grain storage.

The dynamics of agricultural transformation vary considerably by geography.

Key takeaways from the 2020 Global Forum for Food and Agriculture in Berlin.

Can subsidy reforms help fix farmers' current troubles? A discussion at the Indian Economic Association's annual conference.

“Investments in improving nutrition in the first 1000 days should be considered as long-term economic investments because they improve human capital and productivity,” said Professor Reynaldo Martorell from, Emory University.

Providing smallholder farmers access to markets and price information is key to improving agricultural productivity and growth, along with food and nutrition security. In line with this, the Agricultural Commodity Exchange for Africa (ACE) has operated a Market Information System (MIS) and a Warehouse Receipt System (WRS) since 2011. The MIS provides farmers, traders and […]

How can we feed 10 billion people by 2050? How much and in what ways will climate change impact global food production? What can be done to ensure that the world’s agriculture and food systems remain sustainable in both the short and the long term? To answer these and other critical questions, researchers and development […]

New evidence can help shape policies and programs to combat stunting and expand dietary diversity.

A new collaborative program aims at accelerating agricultural development.

The promise of emerging "digitalization ecosystems" for agribusiness.

"Minding the cracks" that emerge when gender is not considered in rural programs.

Lessons from Nigeria and Viet Nam in managing unfolding food and diet transitions.

A project charts better ways to reach farmers with new techniques and information.

Emerging ways to map a complex and poorly understood relationship.

A collaboration among CGIAR centers explores the latest gender research and its applications.

An RCT impact evaluation by IFPRI and partners leads to a dramatic scaling-up. 

A new report explores cross-sectoral efforts to address climate change, poverty, malnutrition, and other complex development challenges.

From value chain development to open markets, ways to build better nutrition.

Why more information does not always equal better services, and other insights.

Agricultural reforms can spark broader growth and development for Ghana, a new book argues.

New insights into nutrition and poverty from IFPRI's PNG Household Survey on Food Systems.

Japanese organizations and businesses are working with African partners on a variety of fronts, from surimi factories to tomato production—a discussion.

Securing billions of dollars in funding and keeping momentum behind essential crop diversity efforts – it's complicated. A discussion.

Innovative approaches to climate change challenges, from R&D to ecological pest control.

Exploring the policy challenges facing African governments as they tackle demographic shifts, climate change, urbanization, and other issues.

From Bangladesh independence to key questions on what drives growth and development.

Cash for Nutrition combined transfers with nutrition education and achieved positive results in difficult circumstances—now more research is needed.

For the third year in a row, global hunger remains stubbornly high, affecting more than 820 million people. A discussion.

How do two major reports with different emphases on the relationship between nutrition and agriculture challenge our daily practices and current policies? 

At the 17th Conference of the Ethiopian Economics Association, discussions of how to fix an "ill economy" and mobilizing society for significant reforms.

What can be done to improve nutrition, health, and economic prospects for Rohingya in camps in Bangladesh? A discussion.

Why a development focus on early childhood nutrition is key—but should look beyond narrow goals such as eliminating stunting.

Lessons on collaborative research from an IFPRI-SNV partnership working in six countries.

The poor in growing urban areas face a double burden of both undernutrition and overnutrition. A new IFPRI research program aims to better understand and address this predicament.

From climate change to urbanization, India faces significant challenges to achieving food security. A new book lays out a path forward.

How IFPRI's presence in developing countries helps to integrate evidence and research into food policy – a discussion.

Food security is about more than just producing food – a discussion.

A Tufts-IFPRI project is analyzing the links between shifting food prices, rising incomes, and nutrition.

Insurance and other forms of financial support can help poor families build resilience to economic and climate shocks—but we need to know more.

A look at the potential of Ghana's rural policies and programs to foster rural revitalization?

The promise of farming tech, building better food value chains, and reducing food loss and waste dominate the agriculture ministers' agenda.

India's rural areas face challenges including climate change and the fallout from rapid urbanization that will require creative, sustained responses – a discussion.

Social protection programs have proven key to alleviating poverty in Africa – what are the next steps? 

Revitalizing rural India depends on joint efforts between government agencies, NGOs, local groups, and other stakeholders – a discussion.

As China pursues an ambitious rural development policy, reports from IFPRI and the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences outline strategies for agriculture, economic growth, and improving living standards.

How Rwanda is charting a path on rural revitalization – a discussion.

Ethiopia's rural areas are at risk. Revitalizing them, and rural regions across Africa, requires a sustained strategic effort.

Bhutan's focus on promoting happiness provides lessons for rural development.

A new report explores the drivers of acute global hunger levels, which have surpassed 100 million for the past three years. 

Bangladesh's ongoing economic transformation offers a model for countries looking to combat poverty, hunger, and other persistent problems in the world's rural areas.

IFPRI researchers offer an agenda for agricultural reform and better nutrition—globally and in Africa.

The Developing Local Extension Capacity (DLEC) program and its annual Global Community of Practice gathering show the promise of combining research with on-the-ground applications.

With high rates of poverty and malnutrition, Malawi's rural areas require a comprehensive development effort. The GFPR offers some potential strategies.

Agricultural reforms will be necessary to satisfy the appetite of India's growing, urbanizing population.

Evidence shows cash transfers help to reduce intimate partner violence. A recent UN Women forum explored what comes next—including how to scale up existing programs. 

IFPRI's flagship publication maps a comprehensive strategy to transform the world's impoverished rural areas.

The world wastes 1.3 billion tons of food each year. Innovative solutions targeting agriculture, food chains, and consumers can make a difference.

How China can leverage its strong position in the global trading system to boost world food security.

As it mounts a major public health initiative, Egypt faces the complex problem of addressing hunger and undernutrition along with overweight and obesity.

The recent report's implications for the fight against malnutrition and for building sustainable food systems in Bangladesh.

A new book explores why the road to ending hunger and malnutrition runs through agriculture.

A new report from the InterAcademy Partnership explores how the sciences can be better applied to achieve regional and global food security.

An innovative exercise helps stakeholders break out of set ways of thinking.

IFPRI researchers on what the evidence shows about sparking local economic development in China and Egypt.

Saltwater is increasingly contaminating fresh water sources, posing grave risks for agriculture in Bangladesh and India that will require creative policy solutions – a discussion.

Why all stakeholders—especially the private sector—must work together to speed up progress to end hunger and nutrition. 

Two IFPRI events look at the evolving picture on farm subsidies, trade, and other issues.

Innovation in the fertilizer industry and in reaching farmers with best practices and knowledge are key to improving fertilizer application and crop health in India.

Facing headwinds including anti-globalization politics, world leaders work to strengthen multilateral action on development issues.

The challenges India and its neighbors face in improving nutrition and food production sustainably—a discussion.

More reliable credit for farmers can help increase agricultural production—a discussion.

Competitors in a new annual contest devise creative tech solutions to focus attention on food security and environmental issues.

At the 28th annual Martin J. Forman lecture.

IFPRI's Women's Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) sheds light on how programs impact household gender dynamics.

Research consistently shows agricultural growth lifts people out of poverty – how is that relationship evolving, and how can policy makers build on it? A discussion.

As the fight against hunger has slowed, climate impacts are rising – a discussion.

Commons—resources held collectively—are key to livelihoods around the world, but their preservation poses serious management challenges: A discussion.

ColdHubs offers an affordable solution to the problem of food spoilage for producers and sellers.

Food Citizenship, a new book by Ray Goldberg of Harvard Business School, interviews the leaders driving change and forming crucial partnerships around food.

What accounts for the explosive growth of some developing countries over the past 25 years, and what are the implications for agriculture and food security? A discussion.

Addressing troubling emerging challenges to the global development agenda.

Why "living animal assets" must be at the center of the food security agenda.

A conference explores the latest insights from the National Family Health Survey.

Committing to work toward ending hunger, promoting sustainable agriculture, and ensuring a sustainable food future for all.

A new book is the first to comprehensively examine the key role of a sometimes overlooked crop.

Why the world is overdue for a paradigm shift in water management.

Hunger and malnutrition are on the rise. Strong political leadership and targeted investments are needed to put food systems back on track – a discussion.

Resilience and sustainability begin in the home, where development programs must address gender and decision making – a discussion.

Two new reports address China's agricultural growth and looming trade challenges.

Applying agricultural technology to build yields and meet the SDGs.

Trade restrictions won't solve the problems of globalization, but smarter policies can – a discussion.

Eradicating global poverty requires a focus on gender equality.

Making food systems function more equitably for consumers, farmers, workers, migrants, and women – a discussion.

“The current food system was not built to promote healthy food” – FAO Director General José Graziano da Silva.

Efforts by Canada and others to promote gender equality in food systems—a discussion.

What can development organizations do to counter the impacts of rising global economic inequality on the rural poor?

Due to conflict and drought, more people face hunger and other forms of food insecurity. What can be done?

Making development investments work to boost food security worldwide – a discussion.

Lessons for the future of crop science and a tribute to a 4-decade research career.

South Korea, Japan, Thailand, the EU, and U.S. offer lessons for China's rural economic policies, IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan tells the China Development Forum.

Global integration can be a boon for Indian farmers but panelists agreed policies must focus on helping farmers and raise their incomes, not simply increase their outputs.

The rise of anti-globalization politics around the world threatens efforts to end hunger and malnutrition – a discussion.

Reforms are necessary to make cocoa farming—the foundation of the global chocoloate industry—profitable for the farmers. A discussion. 

As the world faces growing stresses on natural resources from climate change, population growth, urbanization, and other forces, researchers must grapple with complex questions about sustainable agriculture.

A discussion of IFPRI's Advancing Research on Nutrition and Agriculture (ARENA) project.

Ways that Argentina can use its G20 presidency to strengthen the world's food systems.

Why better data and more effective policies are necessary to guide investments in agriculture and food systems to meet the SDGs.

Why small commercial farmers hold the key to lifting low income countries out of poverty.

The world’s population is will hit 9.5 billion by 2050. Meanwhile, the average age of farmers throughout Africa and Asia is currently 60. Who will feed everyone?

How should development organizations handle the double burden of malnutrition? An IFPRI discussion on the UN High Level Panel of Experts report, Nutrition and Food Systems.

At the 27th Annual Martin J. Forman Memorial Lecture, a focus on getting countries to commit and stay committed to their most valuable resource—their own citizens.

Despite the trend toward cash transfers, many countries retain a mix of food assistance programs.

Participants at an IFPRI policy seminar on how rural areas can be engines for development, boosting food security and living standards.

Participants at an IFPRI forum discuss how best to leverage research efforts and climate-smart agriculture to help the global poor withstand climate change.

Participants at an IFPRI forum warn that the fight against global hunger is hitting choppy waters.

The World Food Programme's aid spending has more than doubled since 2009. Participants at an IFPRI event discuss what that means for the future of food assistance.

As famine grips four countries in Africa, an IFPRI panel discusses how to blunt its impact and head off future humanitarian disasters.

How to scale up a successful nutrition communications and education program.

IFPRI's Director General on how China's economic reforms should target agriculture to end hunger and malnutrition.

Participants in IFPRI's 2017 GFPR launch say a paradigm shift is needed in food policy that bridges the needs of cities and rural areas.

Improved seeds and traits are central to many developing countries’ national strategies for agricultural development and economic growth.

Guest post by Ricardo Meléndez-Ortiz, co-founder and Chief Executive at the ICTSD.

UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16 calls for the global community to “promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.” Speaking at a recent panel discussion held at IFPRI’s home office, John Coonrod, executive vice president of The Hunger […]

At the recent launch of the 2016 Global Food Policy Report in Washington, DC, IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan saw something of a mixed bag for global food security leading into 2016. On the positive side, the international development community made major strides in 2015 in securing the passage of the UN Sustainable Development Goals […]

One of a researcher’s biggest fears is that research outputs go unread, gathering dust on people’s shelves before ending up in the recycling bin.  However, this fear was unfounded for our work on the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI), which has gone from esoteric research tool to a widely-used data collection tool that has […]

This week, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) hosted an International Symposium on The Role of Agricultural Biotechnologies in Sustainable Food Systems and Nutrition at its headquarters in Rome. It has all the trappings and gravitas of a UN meeting: member-nation delegates, placards bearing their countries’ names, earphones streaming simultaneous translations […]

Panelists at the Washington, DC launch of the 2015 Global Hunger Index (GHI) offered sobering facts and heartbreaking stories, but also cause for cautious optimism. The 2015 Global Hunger Index—the tenth in an annual series produced by IFPRI, Concern Worldwide, and Welthungerhilfe that measures hunger globally, regionally, and nationally for 117 countries—shows progress, with a […]

Countries that have significantly lowered their hunger levels tend to have one thing in common. “When you look at results over time since 2000, it’s clear that the countries that have really made inclusive economic growth a priority have made substantially more progress than the countries that have not,” said Summer Allen, research coordinator in […]

Dr. Raisuddin Ahmed served at IFPRI for 25 years and was the Director of the Markets and Structural Studies division of the Institute before becoming an Emeritus Research Fellow in 2001.  He conducted research on agricultural production, trade, marketing and pricing policies in Asia and Africa and studied the effects of infrastructure and technological policies […]

The following is a slightly modified version of a blog story that was originally published on Bread for the World’s Institute Notes. On Saturday, May 30th, Bread for the World Institute and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), partnering with HelpMeViz, will organize a vizathon to bring together a variety of of data heroes— coders, data scientists, designers, and […]

The following is a slightly modified version of a story that was originally published on IFPRI’s Food Security Portal. The last ten years have witnessed incredible economic and agricultural growth in Africa. Between 2000 and 2010, the continent was home to six of the ten fastest-growing economies in the world. However, can this growth continue in a sustainable, […]

At the recent Berlin launch of IFPRI’s Global Food Policy Report, IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan said eradicating hunger by 2025 is an important ethical and economic goal—and one that can be achieved. Five expert panelists and more than 100 attendees gathered at the Berlin Representation of the German development organization GIZ to discuss concrete actions to move the world […]

The following post by IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan was originally published on the Chicago Council on Global Affairs Global Food for Thought blog. This post is part of a series produced by The Chicago Council on Global Affairs, marking the occasion of its fifth Global Food Security Symposium 2014 in Washington, D.C., which was held on May 22. The growing incidence and […]

“If the past is any guide, we will face a barrage of shocks, both natural and man‐made, in the coming years. In just the past five years, we have seen a major earthquake in Haiti; drought in the Horn of Africa; earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear crisis in Japan; and conflicts that have left millions of […]

We live in a fast changing world with fast changing trends: urbanization, globalization, industrialization, and more, all of which have a profound impact on the way food moves from field to fork along the agricultural value chain. Understanding the chain, and how to make it work for smallholder farmers, is a central theme in research […]

“Don’t just ‘walk the talk’ — run, or even fly, the talk!” IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan made this call to action at a policy seminar yesterday to mark the release IFPRI’s second annual Global Food Policy Report. The event brought a full house to IFPRI’s DC office to hear perspectives on food policy developments, trends, and […]

2011 saw significantly increased support of agriculture and food policy as tools for global poverty reduction. It also brought serious challenges, most notably in the form of food price volatility, extreme weather shocks, famine, unrest, and conflicts. IFPRI’s new flagship publication, the Global Food Policy Report, presents a broad picture of 2011’s major food policy […]

Ministers, international partners, and other stakeholders are meeting December 18th in Sana’a, Yemen to officially launch the Yemen National Food Security Strategy (NFSS). The strategy, for which IFPRI provided key analysis and technical advice, was recently approved by the Special Ministerial Committee on Food Security. The event also launches an innovative interactive research tool: the Digital […]

The Chronic Poverty Research Centre (CPRC) marked ten years of poverty research with an international conference, “Ten years of ‘war against poverty’. What we have learned since 2000. What we should do 2010-2020,” held in Manchester, UK, September 8-10. Leading poverty researchers and development practitioners met to assess the current ‘state of the art’ in poverty reduction, […]

Global demand for biofuels has risen sharply over the last decade, driven initially by oil price hikes and the need for greater energy security. Support measures were established in many countries in recognition of the potential of biofuel development in reducing dependence on fossil fuels, increasing farm revenues, and generating less environmental damage through lower […]