FAO’s Report on The Future of Food and Agriculture

• According to the Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) new report, The Future of Food and Agriculture — Drivers and Triggers for Transformation, if agrifood systems remain unchanged, the world will face persistent food insecurity.
• The purpose of this report is to stimulate strategic thinking and action to transform agrifood systems toward a more sustainable, resilient, and inclusive future.

What are the Report's Findings?

• Agrifood System Drivers: There are 18 interconnected socioeconomic and environmental forces known as drivers that interact and shape the various activities that occur within agrifood systems, such as farming, food processing, and food consumption.
• Poverty and inequalities, geopolitical instability, scarcity, and resource degradation, and climate change are some of the key drivers, and how they are addressed and managed will determine the future of food.

Food Insecurity Concerns:

• If agrifood systems remain unchanged, the world will face persistent food insecurity, depleting resources, and unsustainable economic growth in the future.
• The world is "terribly off track" in terms of meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which include agrifood targets.
• Many of the SDGs are off track and will only be achieved if agrifood systems are properly transformed to withstand ongoing global adversity that undermines food security and nutrition due to growing structural and regional inequalities.
• By 2050, the world will have 10 billion people to feed, posing an unprecedented challenge if significant efforts are not made to reverse current trends.

Future Prospects:

• There will be four future scenarios for agrifood systems, each with a different impact on food security, nutrition, and overall sustainability.
• More of the same, which entails continuing to muddle along by reacting to events and crises.
• A modified future in which some progress toward sustainable agrifood systems occurs at a slow and uncertain pace.
• The race to the bottom depicts a world in disarray in its worst form.
• Trading off for sustainability, in which short-term GDP growth is exchanged for inclusiveness, resilience, and sustainability of agrifood, socioeconomic, and environmental systems.

What are the recommendations?

• Decision-makers must look beyond immediate needs. A lack of vision, piecemeal approaches, and quick fixes will cost everyone dearly.
• There is an urgent need to alter course in order to create a more sustainable and resilient future for agrifood systems.

There is a need to work on the following key "triggers of transformation":

• Better governance.
• Customers who are critical and well-informed.
• Improved income and wealth distribution
• Innovative technologies and methods.
• A comprehensive transformation, on the other hand, will come at a cost and will necessitate a trade-off of contrasting objectives that governments, policymakers, and consumers must address and balance while dealing with resistance to the paradigm shift.

About Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)?

• FAO is a United Nations specialized agency that leads international efforts to end hunger.
• Every year on October 16th, the world celebrates World Food Day. The day commemorates the anniversary of the FAO's founding in 1945.
• It is one of the United Nations food aid organizations based in Rome (Italy). The World Food Programme and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) are its sister organizations.

Initiatives Launched:

• Agricultural Heritage Systems of Global Importance (GIAHS).
• Monitors the status of Desert Locusts all over the world.
• The Codex Alimentarius Commission, or CAC, is in charge of overseeing the implementation of the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Programme.
• The International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture was adopted by the Thirty-First Session of the Conference of the FAO in 2001.

Flagship Publications:

• The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture (SOFIA).
• The State of the World's Forests (SOFO).
• The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI).
• The State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA).
• The State of Agricultural Commodity Markets (SOCO).

Global Report on Health Equity for Disables

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a report titled Global report on health equity for persons with disabilities ahead of the International Day of Persons with Disabilities (3rd December).

What are the Report's Findings?

Statistics about Disabilities:

• Globally, approximately 1.3 billion people, or one in every six, are currently disabled.
• Because of systemic and persistent health inequities, many people with disabilities are at risk of dying much sooner—up to 20 years earlier—than people without disabilities.
• Because an estimated 80% of people with disabilities live in low- and middle-income countries with limited resources, addressing these inequities is difficult.

Disabilities Pose a Risk:

• They are twice as likely to develop chronic illnesses such as asthma, depression, diabetes, obesity, dental problems, and stroke.
• Many disparities in health outcomes can be attributed to preventable, unfair, and unjust circumstances rather than underlying health conditions.

Some Causes of Healthcare Inequity:

• Healthcare providers' hostile attitudes
• Health information formats that are incomprehensible
• Access to a health center is hampered by physical barriers, a lack of transportation, or financial constraints.

What are the suggestions?

• It is critical to ensure that people with disabilities fully and effectively participate in all aspects of society, as well as to instill inclusion, accessibility, and non-discrimination in the medical field.
• Health systems should be reducing, not adding to, the difficulties that people with disabilities face.
• Ensuring health equity for people with disabilities has broader implications and can help to advance global health priorities in three ways: health equity for all is critical to achieving universal health coverage; inclusive public health interventions delivered equitably across sectors can contribute to healthier populations; and
• Promoting health equity for people with disabilities is a critical component of all efforts to protect everyone in times of health emergency.
• Governments, health partners, and civil society should ensure that all health sector actions include people with disabilities so that they can exercise their right to the best possible health.

What are the Initiatives for the Empowerment of the Disabled?

India:

• Right of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016
• Unique Disability Identification Portal
• Accessible India Campaign
• DeenDayal Disabled Rehabilitation Scheme
• Assistance to Disabled Persons for Purchase/fitting of Aids and Appliances
• National Fellowship for Students with Disabilities.

Global:

• Incheon Strategy to “Make the Right Real” for Persons with Disabilities in Asia and the Pacific.
• United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disability.
• International Day of Persons with Disabilities
• UN Principles for People with Disabilities

Forced Displacement: UNDP Report

• According to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) report "Turning the Tide on Internal Displacement: A Development Approach to Solutions," more than 100 million people will be forcibly displaced in 2022, the majority of whom will be within their own countries, for the first time in history.

What are the Report's Findings?

Statistics:

• Over 59 million people were forcibly displaced within their own countries by the end of 2021 as a result of conflict, violence, disasters, and climate change.
• Before the Ukraine war, an estimated 6.5 million people were internally displaced.
• Climate change may force more than 216 million people to relocate within their own countries by 2050.
• Internal displacement caused by disasters is becoming even more widespread, with new displacements recorded in over 130 countries and territories in 2021.
• Approximately 30% of professional lives became unemployed, and 24% were unable to earn money in the same way they had previously. 48% of internally displaced households earned less money than they did before they were displaced.
• Impact: Internally Displaced Persons struggle to meet their basic needs, find decent work and maintain a consistent source of income.
• Female and youth-headed households are disproportionately affected.
• Forced displacement is most prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and North Africa, and parts of the Americas.
• The direct global impact of internal displacement is estimated to be more than USD 21.5 billion in 2021, owing to the financial cost of providing housing, education, health, and security, and accounts to every internally displaced person.
• A lack of accurate and widely accepted statistics on displacement has resulted in a lack of policies for displaced people.

Suggestions:

• Longer-term development action is required to reverse record levels of internal displacement, with climate change expected to uproot millions more people.
• Humanitarian assistance alone will not suffice to address the world's record levels of internal displacement. There is a need to develop new approaches to dealing with the consequences of internal displacement from a development standpoint.

There are five key development solutions that can be implemented:

• Institutional strengthening of governance
• Increasing socioeconomic integration through increased access to jobs and services
• Restoring safety
• Increasing participation
• Increasing social cohesion

What is the United Nations Development Program?

• The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is the global development network of the United Nations.
• The United Nations Development Programme was formed by the merger of the United Nations Expanded Programme of Technical Assistance and the United Nations Special Fund.
• The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1965 and began operations in January 1966.
• It offers expert advice, training, and grants to developing countries, with a growing emphasis on assisting the least developed countries.
• The UNDP Executive Board is comprised of representatives from 36 countries who serve on a rotating basis.
• It is entirely supported by voluntary contributions from member countries.
• UNDP is at the heart of the United Nations Sustainable Development Group (UNSDG), a 165-country network that brings together the 40 UN funds, programs, specialized agencies, and other bodies working to advance the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
• Human Development Index is a UNDP publication.