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This week's round up of the latest news, research, and policy developments from across global agriculture.
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CONTENT
December 8-14, 2017
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Zimbabwe Orders Illegal Settlers to Vacate Farms, New York Times, December 13
Zimbabwe's new agriculture minister ordered illegal occupiers of farms to vacate the land immediately. Violent land seizures in 2000 sent the agricultural sector—the mainstay of Zimbabwe's economy—into a tail-spin, triggering a broader slump that saw GDP almost halve between 2000 and 2008. President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who replaced Mugabe as leader last month, has promised to stabilize the economy, including agriculture.
Development Aid Isn't Reaching the Poorest. Here's What That Means, Opinion, Ryan Briggs, Washington Post, December 13
The good news is that global poverty is falling. The bad news? It’s getting harder to reach the world’s poor. This presents a challenge for foreign aid donors, and to their goals of eradicating extreme poverty by 2030. Meeting these ambitious goals will require donors to direct aid to more remote areas—where the poorest live—rather than urban areas, where aid projects are often easier and cheaper to execute.
New Crops, Technology Needed to Help Farmers Adapt to Rising Heat: Gates Foundation, Reuters, December 12
New technologies are the key to helping Africa and Asia’s smallholder farmers adapt to climate change. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation unveiled a $300 million plan to help farmers, with funds going to the development of crops that could cope with rising temperatures, wild weather, and attacks from new pests and diseases.
Guest Commentary—Food Waste: Breaking Down the Issue that Won’t Break Down, Chicago Council on Global Affairs, December 8
Food waste threatens our ecological future and worsens climate change. The problem is that food waste is not just a singular issue—it is the culmination of its subsidiary issues makes food waste so dangerous. Jordan Henderson, a fall intern with the Council’s Global Food and Agriculture Program, breaks down this complex issue and highlights promising solutions to save resources and reduce costs.
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GLOBAL DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES
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Pakistan Moves to Evict 21 Foreign Aid Groups, Washington Post, December 14
Pakistan has ordered 21 foreign aid groups to wrap up their activities and prepare to leave after they failed to re-register under tough regulations introduced two years ago. The NGOs have been given two months to close their offices and vacate the country. Pakistan has long treated foreign aid groups with suspicion, fearing they could mask efforts to spy on the country.
Sir Lanka Partners with US to End HIV/AIDs in Country by 2025, Xinhua Net, December 12
Sri Lanka and the United States have launched a two-year HIV/AIDS Technical Assistance Partnership to fast track government efforts to end AIDS in the country by 2025. The Sri Lankan government is committed to ending AIDS in the island country by 2025, ahead of the United Nations' Global Commitment to end AIDS by 2030.
Governments and Civil Society Step up Efforts to Help Mountain People Better Cope with Climate Change, Hunger and Migration, FAO, December 11
Some 60 countries and over 200 civil society organizations pledged to strengthen mountain people’s resilience in the face of rising climate change, hunger, and migration. As mountain people become more vulnerable, migration increases. Those who remain are often women, left to manage the farms with little access to credit, training, and land tenure rights.
USAID Announces $7.5 Million Award to UNICEF to Fight Malnutrition Among Rohingya Refugees, Relief Web, December 11
USAID has awarded $7.5 million to the UNICEF under the Food for Peace Act to improve the nutritional status of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. With this new award, the US Government has provided over $90 million to assist Rohingya refugees since August 24. Over 625,000 Rohingya have fled violence in Myanmar since August 25.
SEE ALSO: USAID Announces $7.5 Million Award to UNICEF to Fight Malnutrition Among Rohingya Refugees, US Embassy in Bangladesh, December 11
UN Says 1.25 Million South Sudanese Are 1 Step from Famine, Washington Post, December 8
Over 1.2 million people in war-torn South Sudan are one step away from famine—twice as many as at the same time last year—and in early 2018, half the country’s population will be reliant on emergency food aid. Even though 2 million people have fled the country over the past four years, 7 million people inside the country—almost two-thirds of the remaining population—still need humanitarian aid.
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USAID Starts Project to Establish 20 University Centers for Vocational Development, Egypt Today, December 13
USAID in Egypt and the American University in Cairo announced the start of a project to establish 20 university centers for vocational development to provide Egyptian students with training in the fields of leadership, entrepreneurship, and vocational communication to qualify them to enter the work market. The centers aim at achieving communication between the students of the Egyptian universities and the private sector to increase work opportunities.
WTO Losing Trade Focus, Too Easy on Some Developing Nations: US, Reuters, December 11
US president Donald Trump’s trade chief said that the WTO is losing its focus on trade negotiations in favor of litigation, and was going too easy on wealthier developing countries, such as China. US opposition has raised concerns that the WTO will not be able to accomplish even modest goals, such as addressing fishing and agricultural subsidies, at the conference.
SEE ALSO: Lighthizer Defends US Ag in WTO Meeting, AGNet West, December 14
What Will US Foreign Aid Look like in the Age of Trump?, LA Times, December 8
Foreign aid accounts for about 1 percent of the federal budget and President Trump has proposed significant cuts. While congressional budget negotiators have pledged to restore some of the funding, it has reignited a debate over foreign assistance. USAID Administrator Mark Green, a Republican former congressman, acknowledges that in the current political climate the agency must be “as effective and efficient as we possibly can.”
White House Pressures Big Corn to Meet on US Biofuels Policy, Reuters, December 8
President Trump's administration called lawmakers from the US corn belt to convince them to join talks about potential changes to biofuels policy. Oil refiners say the law is putting them out of business, but ethanol interests have vehemently opposed any changes. The talks could lay the groundwork for overhaul of the program, but would require cooperation from representatives of the corn industry to pass Congress.
SEE ALSO: White House to Host Fresh Biofuels Talks to Help Refiners: Sources, Reuters, December 12
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BIG IDEAS AND EMERGING INNOVATIONS
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How the Food Industry Uses Cavitation, the Ocean's Most Powerful Punch, NPR, December 11
Cavitation is when low pressure in a liquid produces a bubble that rapidly collapses, and heats up to 20,000 Kelvin. In brewing beer, cavitation processed and converted more of the starch in barley to brewable sugars in less time, at lower temperatures. It can also neutralize a large spectrum of spoiling and harmful microbes much more effectively and efficiently than most other technologies.
Wind Energy Is Supposed to Help Fight Climate Change. It Turns out Climate Change Is Fighting Back, Washington Post, December 11
A changing climate is beginning to change wind energy’s potential to provide power in key regions, part of what could be a broader diminishment of a key renewable energy source in part of the world. While the world is turning more and more to renewable sources of energy to fight climate change, climate change itself alters the distribution of wind, changing, and even shrinking the regional potential of this energy source.
SEE REPORT: Wind-Generated Electricity in China: Decreasing Potential, Inter-Annual Variability and Association with Changing Climate, Scientific Reports, November 24
Promising to 'Make Our Planet Great Again,' Macron Lures 13 US Climate Scientists to France, Washington Post, December 11
Following the withdrawal of the United States from the Paris climate accord, French President Macron took to social media to invite American climate scientists to come to France. Now, two years after the Paris climate accord was adopted, the French government is unveiling a list of 18 “laureates”—13 of them working in the United States—who have won a “Make Our Planet Great Again” competition for $70 million of research grants awarded.
The Dirty Secret of the World’s Plan to Avert Climate Disaster, Wired, December 10
The United Nations envisions 116 scenarios in which global temperatures are prevented from rising more than 2°C. In 101 of them, that goal is accomplished by sucking massive amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere—a concept called “negative emissions”—and this would need to happen by midcentury. Which raises a question: has the world come to rely on an imaginary technology to save it?
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FOOD AND AGRICULTURAL ISSUES
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Plant-Based Burgers Are Turning the Grocery Meat Aisle into a Protein Aisle, Quartz, December 13
Less than a year after getting its plant-based burgers into the meat sections at mainstream grocery stores, Beyond Meat is ramping up production. Beyond Meat, backed by tech titan Bill Gates and Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio, among other investors, is starting to make take some of the overall market share of meat products away from conventional meat producers.
SEE ALSO: Plant-Based Burger Maker Beyond Meat Cooks Up More Funding, Wall Street Journal, December 7
How Much Food Do We Waste? Probably More Than You Think, New York Times, December 12
The less the world wastes, the easier it will be to meet the food needs of the global population in coming years. Second, cutting back on waste could go a long way to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Very little food in poor countries is thrown out by consumers. It’s too precious. But in wealthy countries around 40 percent of wasted food is thrown out by consumers.
Mass Starvation Is Humanity’s Fate If We Keep Flogging the Land to Death, The Guardian, Opinion, George Monbiot, December 11
By the middle of this century there will be two or three billion more people on Earth. At its current pace, humanity will begin to face ecological disasters like water loss, soil degradation, and global temperature rise. From these disasters, a new green revolution will begin. The next green revolution will rely not on flogging the land to death, but on reconsidering how we use it and why.
Nearly Half the Antibiotics Used in Farming Go to Cows, Quartz, December 8
In the United States, about 43 percent of medically important drugs are used on cattle, 37 percent on pigs, and about 15 percent for chickens and turkeys. In the past few years, poultry companies have proactively moved to reduce the amount of antibiotics they use. A new report by the USDA shows sales of antibiotics to farmers dropped by 14 percent between 2015 and 2016, the first decrease since the agency began publishing such data in 2009.
SEE REPORT: 2016 Summary Report on Antimicrobials Sold or Distributed for Use in Food-Producing Animals, FDA, December 7
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EU Parliament Votes Against Banning Key Kebab Additive, New York Times, December 13
The European Parliament narrowly defeated plans to ban an additive that is considered key in industrial meats for the popular doner kebab. The decision had been hotly awaited by the doner kebab industry, which says it needs the phosphates to keep the frozen meat juicy, tender, and tasty for consumption. Others argued that the phosphates were a health risk for cardiovascular diseases.
UNICEF: 400,000 Congo Children Suffering Severe Malnutrition, Washington Post, December 12
At least 400,000 children under five in Congo’s troubled Kasai region are severely malnourished. That region has experienced deadly violence for more than a year and a half, displacing 1.4 million people. Crops have been neglected and destroyed, and more than 220 health centers have been shuttered, both hindering efforts to improve childhood nutrition and health.
More Than 8 Million Yemenis 'a Step Away from Famine': UN, Reuters, December 11
Warring sides must let more aid get through to 8.4 million people who are a step away from famine in Yemen, a senior UN official said. The continuing blockade of ports is limiting supplies of fuel, food, and medicines, dramatically increasing the number of vulnerable people who need help. The conflict has killed more than 10,000 people and triggered a cholera epidemic that has infected about 1 million people.
SEE ALSO: US Urges Saudis to Allow Humanitarian Aid Immediately, Al Jazeera, December 9
A Nasty, NAFTA-Related Surprise: Mexico’s Soaring Obesity, New York Times, December 11
Few predicted when Mexico joined the free-trade deal that it would transform the country in a way that would saddle millions with diet-related illnesses. In 1980, 7 percent of Mexicans were obese, a figure that tripled to 20.3 percent by 2016. Diabetes is now Mexico’s top killer, claiming 80,000 lives a year.
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ENVIRONMENT, WATER, AND CLIMATE
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Climate Change Might Make Chocolate Taste Better, Which Gives Us Mixed Feelings, Newsweek, December 12
Good news, chocolate-lovers: climate change may have a silver lining. It could make the delicious, sweet treat even tastier. According to a recent study, the type of weather that a cocoa tree is raised in can impact how the fermented seeds, the main ingredient in chocolate, taste.
SEE REPORT: Environmental Growing Conditions in Five Production Systems Induce Stress Response and Affect Chemical Composition of Cocoa (Theobroma Cacao L.) Beans, Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, November 7
Waste Not, Want Not: Drink Beer to Feed Fish and Help Save The Planet, NPR, December 12
In New York, perch, bass, catfish and trout are the first fruits of an innovative project aimed at turning waste into food. The system takes the heaps of waste grain and composts the energy-rich material. This supports colonies of microbes and invertebrates, including worms and snails, which are in turn dispensed into the tanks of hungry fish.
Smaller Farms Can Cope Better with Climate Change in India, Reuters, December 11
India’s small farmers are better equipped than large landowners to deal with climate change, but need more support to find innovative ways to minimize the impacts of higher temperatures, uneven rainfall, floods, and droughts. While the small size of the land holding is often seen as a challenge to raising incomes, it is an advantage when it comes to tackling extreme weather and rising temperatures.
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GENDER AND GENERATIONAL INCLUSION
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Women in Low-Wage US Farm Jobs Say #MeToo, Al Jazeera, December 12
Last month, the Alianza Nacional de Campesinas, an organization representing about 700,000 current and former farmworker women, published an open letter in solidarity with women who have come forward across the United States to share stories of sexual harassment and assault. Women from around the world have used the hashtag #MeToo on social media to share their experiences and show solidarity with one another.
Cutting the Gender Gap in Vermont’s Meat-Processing Industry, Seven Days, December 12
Vermont's slaughter and meat-cutting facilities are critical links in the supply chain for local meat, but they generally suffer from a labor shortage. While there is no single solution to the challenges facing the meat-processing industry, some believe it could benefit from the involvement of more women. However, not too many people want to work this hard in this kind of place, women or men.
USAID Celebrates Contributes of Women in Agribusiness, Ghana News Agency, December 8
USAID and MEL Consulting Limited have hosted a Women in Agribusiness Summit to highlight the contributions of women in Ghana’s agriculture sector. The event promoted investment opportunities and linked women-led agribusinesses to business advisory service providers and financial institutions. The summit was organized through the Feed the Future initiative and its partners.
Closing the Gender Gap in Agriculture is Economically Viable, Report Concludes, All Africa, December 8
Addressing the gender gap in agriculture is expected to lead to economic gains, reduce poverty levels and also improve nutrition. Often, a male and female farmer with the same plot size farms end up with the woman having access to poorer quality inputs and technology, leading to lower productivity. The report recommends that countries should focus on the most costly constraints to women's productivity.
SEE REPORT: The Cost of the Gender Gap in Agricultural Productivity in Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda, UN Women, October 1
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MARKET ACCESS, TRADE, AND AGRIBUSINESS
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Winemakers Worry Wildfires Will Leave Whiff of Ashtray In Their Wine, NPR, December 13
Wildfires in October in Northern California and this month in Southern California have left acres of wine country scorched and black. Smoke taint can happen when grapes are exposed to smoke. The resulting wine has an unpleasant taste, often described as ashy, burnt, and ashtray-like. The closer the grapes are to harvest, the more susceptible they are to the compounds.
More Victims of the California Wildfires: Avocados and Lemons, New York Times, December 13
The wildfires in Southern California have charred hundreds of thousands of acres and destroyed thousands of structures. They have also taken a toll on agriculture, a $45 billion industry in California that employs more than 400,000 people statewide. The Thomas fire, which has now spread from Ventura County into Santa Barbara County, struck the biggest avocado- and lemon-producing region in the United States.
Thriving French Organic Food Market Needs Domestic Supply Boost -Study, Reuters, December 12
Farmers need to boost organic food production in France to meet fast-growing demand or consumers will turn to imports at the expense of some environmental benefits. France is the third-largest organic food market, with 7 percent of the global market in 2015, behind the United States (more than 40 percent) and Germany (11 percent) but just ahead of China, Canada, and other EU countries.
Swigging Cashew, Sorghum, and Sugarcane: the Ghanaian Entrepreneurs Competing for Ghana’s Drinkers, Food Tank, December 11
While commercial beers, imported spirits, and wines can be found at bars, parties, and even funerals across Ghana, taste for local tipples are gaining momentum driven by patriotic pushing for Ghana-made products. Ghanaian brewers are beginning to incorporate local ingredients like sorghum and cashews instead of traditional ingredients like wheat and barley.
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