As part of our ongoing series that explores the state of the negotiations on the Sustainable Development Goals, we asked Rajul Pandya-Lorch, Sivan Yosef, and Laura Zseleczky of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) to explain why smallholder farmers should be a key consideration at the UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction, which is taking place in Sendai, Japan, this week.

As delegates gather today for the Third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in Sendai, we hope that building up the resilience of smallholder farmers remains a key theme of their vital discussions. Incorporating the experience of farmers engaged in all aspects of agriculture into the post-2015 framework for disaster risk reduction can go a long way in building up the resilience of the majority of the world’s poor and vulnerable people, and creating a global food system that is sustainable, healthy, and resilient to disasters and other shocks.

Every year, the food and nutrition security of millions of people around the world is affected by a variety of shocks and stresses. These shocks range from natural disasters such as droughts, flooding, and earthquakes to financial crises, food price volatility, conflict, and political instability to everyday stresses such as poverty, illness, and malnutrition. As different regions undergo major shifts such as urbanization, dietary transitions, and climate change, some of these shocks may increase in frequency, intensity, or impact in the coming years.

Smallholder farmers are especially vulnerable to shocks. While smallholders produce most of the food in developing regions of the world, they nevertheless lack the tools to manage climate variability, face inefficient or nonexistent markets, and lack agricultural inputs and services that can help smooth shocks and stresses. The impact of these shocks can be detrimental, especially when considering that malnutrition has lifelong and intergenerational effects on productivity, income, educational attainment, and physical and cognitive development. Conversely, the wellbeing and livelihoods of farmers also affect the stability of their communities and beyond. The secondary effects of drought in 2010, coupled with unfavorable trade policies, affected a large percentage of agricultural land in affected regions, and led to food prices to spike around the world, contributing to social unrest in some areas. How then can we build up smallholders’ resilience for food and nutrition security, or help farmers, their communities, and the global food system to which they contribute get better at predicting, preventing, coping with, and recovering from shocks?

In May 2014, with the concept of resilience gaining traction in the development community, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and its 2020 Vision Initiative held an international conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, with the support of Farming First and other partners. The conference, “Building Resilience for Food and Nutrition Security,” brought together 800 people from many fields and sectors to consider what resilience means; what shocks we can expect in the coming years; how we can measure and build resilience; and, as the deadline for the Millennium Development Goals draws near, how we can incorporate resilience into the post-2015 development agenda.

The conference and its associated papers, briefs, and other resources converged on a few key conclusions on reducing risk for farmers, and the benefits of doing so. Country and regional experiences show that raising agricultural growth and farmers’ incomes will increase the resilience not only of the farmers themselves but also of society at large by providing a stable buffer against shocks. Introducing new technologies, such as mobile phones that connect farmers to markets, in a participatory way that includes farmers’ own knowledge and input, can help move them up and away from subsistence-level livelihoods.

The event identified a number of specific actions that can be taken now to build up the resilience of farmers. These include, among others:

• Empower vulnerable and excluded people by ensuring their access to the same productive resources that others receive, including credit, extension services, and agricultural inputs such as diverse modern seeds, improved fertilizers, mechanization equipment, and rural advisory and extension services for smallholder farmers, especially women;
• Keep farmers central in the process of building resilience to climate change by focusing small-scale mitigation and adaptation efforts in areas with degraded land, highly variable weather, and frequent weather shocks;
• Create and maintain efficient and well-regulated futures and exchange markets for commodities to help farmers and other agents mitigate and hedge against risks;
• Invest in crops and products that may be more resilient to climate, drought, and pests, but are still readily accessible to smallholders, such as millet or sorghum, or horticultural crops, which have high nutritional value but can also provide higher incomes for smallholder households; and
• Shift the focus of agricultural research and development to go beyond just increasing yields and consider other important crop characteristics, such as nutritional value; tolerance to stresses like heat, drought, and salt; and greater water and energy efficiency.

Essential duties will include facilitating a shared clear vision for the resilience research area among IFPRI’s divisions and the two CGIAR Research Programs led by the Institute; shaping an innovative research area that can bring evidence to bear on policies and programs to strengthen resilience for food and nutrition security; and developing, implementing, and coordinating the resilience research area, including providing intellectual and management leadership. This position will be based in the Director General’s Office in Washington, DC and will report to the Chief of Staff.

To learn more, see the full position description.

The keynote address by Dr. Sohail J. Malik, Chairman of Innovative Development Strategies (Pvt) Ltd. (IDS) offered suggestions for connecting the disconnects to create a more resilient Pakistan. He noted the importance of agriculture for the country’s resilience and called for a systems approach inclusive of stakeholders from all sectors to build resilience for food and nutrition security and ensure that poor people improve their well-being.

The event was held as a result of a consultative process led by the Planning Commission of Pakistan and the Ministry for National Food Security and Research with support from the USAID-funded PSSP.

Watch video clips from the conference and click here to view the conference agenda. Read more about the event in the USAID Press Release.

Prof. Paarlberg reported that the conference generated a wide variety of short-term impacts, some larger than others, felt both at the level of individual conference participants and within the organizations that sent them to Addis, and last but not least within the organizing institutions.  Most of these impacts took the form of accelerated learning and increased coordination and partnering across organizations, at both the program and project level.  Surveys and interviews confirmed that many of these impacts will be durable rather than just temporary.  The individuals and organizations that gained most from the conference were those that came to Addis not as passive listeners but with an active program or networking agenda of their own.

The report provides a comprehensive assessment of the impact of the IFPRI 2020 Conference and how the resilience landscape is changing since then, as well as lessons on how organizations can measure the impact of their events and build in monitoring and evaluation into program and event design.

Visit the IFPRI website to read the full report and the brief.

IFPRI’s Director General, Shenggen Fan, joined Earnán O’Cléirigh of Irish Aid, Nick Chisholm of University College Cork, Connell Foley of Concern Worldwide, Nora Owen of the Institute of International and European Affairs (IIEA) and Rajul Pandya-Lorch of IFPRI at a seminar organized by the IIEA on November 17 in Dublin to discuss how building resilience to economic, environmental and political shocks in the developing world is intrinsically connected to investment in nutrition and food security. Click here to listen to the speakers’ remarks and view their presentation slides.