The CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Improved Nutrition and Health management is seeking help in renaming its program. The management team is looking for a short and meaningful name that is easily understood. The name should portray how agricultural research, practices, interventions, and policies can help improve health and nutrition benefits and reduce health risks. A small token of appreciation will be offered to the selected submission. Deadline for submission is May 14, 2012. To submit a name(s), please complete this survey monkey.
Malawi Conference Report Released
A Conference Report for the first national-level follow up event to the 2020 conference, has been released. The report on "Unleashing Agriculture's Potential for Improved Nutrition and Health in Malawi," a consultation held in Lilongwe, Malawi last September, summarizes the main themes and issues discussed during the conference sessions. It also presents the main outcome of the conference, a Policy Action Note that calls for specific actions to be taken for making agricultural policies and programs in Malawi more nutrition-and health-friendly. The report can now be downloaded.
Policy Action Note From the Malawi Conference Is Now Available!
Malawi conference marks successful step towards translating global findings to the country level
The inaugural session set the stage and featured several key government officials. Malawi's Minister of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development Peter Mwanza officially launched the conference and emphasized the need to rejuvenate existing links between the three sectors. He was introduced by Erica Maganga, the Secretary for Agriculture and Food Security at Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development.
Policy seminar examines role of agriculture for UN meeting on noncommunicable diseases
Last Thursday, IFPRI hosted a policy seminar on “Leveraging Agriculture to Tackle Noncommunicable Diseases” that explored how to take advantage of the connections between agriculture and noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) and how food and agriculture research can become part of the dialogue at the high-level meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, to be held on September 19-20.
Chaired by Marie Ruel of IFPRI, the seminar featured a panel of multi-sectoral speakers. Professor Tim Lang, City University London, discussed major drivers and emerging trends with regard to the linkages between agriculture and these diseases. Rachel Nugent, Center for Global Development, talked about the recent rise of NCDs in international development and policy dialogue. She notably mentioned the 2020 Conference in Delhi as key example of this change. Derek Yach, PepsiCo, concluded with a discussion about the important role of the private sector in improving food and nutrition security.
Visit the IFPRI page to view speakers' presentations and PowerPoints.
Malawi conference will devise country level strategies to strengthen linkages
On September 26-27, 2011, IFPRI’s Malawi office and its 2020 Vision Initiative, in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security and supported by USAID and Irish Aid’s offices in Malawi, will hold a conference in Lilongwe, Malawi, that will bring together key players on agriculture, nutrition and health.
The event Unleashing Agriculture’s Potential For Nutrition & Health in Malawi will draw from the key global recommendations from the 2020 International Conference in Delhi and examine how these can be applied to the country specific level. Malawi’s experiences tackling agriculture, health, and nutrition issues provide a starting point to guide and inform how to create more synergies between the three sectors.Brussels event explores potential of biofortification to reduce malnutrition
This past June, HarvestPlus and the UK Department for International Development (DFID) co-hosted a meeting in Brussels to discuss the potential of agricultural-based approaches, such as biofortification, to reduce malnutrition.
The event featured a wide range of presenters from research and policy fields. To follow-up on IFPRI’s 2020 Conference, the first panel discussed how biofortification can fit into initiatives to leverage agriculture for improved nutrition and health. New research results and developments were also presented. The event concluded with a brainstorming session to identify next steps for moving biofortification and HarvestPlus forward.
For the full-length blog article, agenda, and participant bios, visit the HarvestPlus website.
Briefing reaffirms importance of agriculture and nutrition linkages
More than 200 policy experts and stakeholders gathered to learn about and discuss the challenges of malnutrition and potential policy action to be taken. Participants represented a range of actors from embassies, international organizations, civil society and the Brussels development community at large.
The half-day program featured leading experts, including several speakers from the 2020 Conference in Delhi: Howarth Bouis, Boitshepo “Bibi” Giyose, Corinna Hawkes, Robert Mwadime, Rajul Pandya-Lorch, and Per Pinstrup-Andersen.
Check out the program, speaker powerpoints and bios, and topic reader here.
CTA briefing explores agriculture and nutrition linkages in ACP countries
The next Brussels Policy Briefing will focus on agriculture and nutrition in ACP countries, giving new perspective to the themes highlighted during the 2020 Conference. The half-day event, co-organised by CTA with IFPRI, the ACP Secretariat, and DG DEVCO, will take place on Wednesday, June 15, 2011.
The first panel discussion will explore the key challenges and opportunities for achieving nutrition security, specifically in the context of ACP countries. The second panel will look at how policies and actions on the global, regional, and national level as well as across sectors can improve the linkages between agriculture and nutrition in future. For a short introduction into the topic, check out this note.
The event is open to the public, and you can register online. Please direct questions and journalist enquiries to the email address: brussels.briefings@cta.int.
London workshop delves deeper into conference themes
The two-day workshop brought together more than 100 people from health and agriculture communities around the world. Day one featured a discussion of existing metrics and methods together with their value and limitations and highlighted a range of case studies that illustrated the practical application of these methods in different contexts. Day two focused on practice and policy aspects of measuring food security and nutritional outcomes.
The program, speaker powerpoints, and photos from the workshop are now available on the LCIRAH website.