Building Food System Resilience In Protracted Crisis Situations

Building food system resilience in protracted crises is an important goal of Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (REPRO). REPRO adopts a food system – target system interface systems’ approach to analyse, understand and build absorptive, adaptive and transformative food system resilience capacities in the face of shocks and stressors, in order to improve food and nutrition outcomes. Each REPRO country has a specific thematic focus for which a facilitation tool will be developed and published. This working document is a such part of the series of FoSRA publications under FNSREPRO, with s special focus on the food-fodder system interface and its assessment. This working document is a collaborative effort between the Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI) of Wageningen University and Research (WUR) and FAO Somalia under the Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (FNS-REPRO). The proposed methodology and tools will be field tested in Somaliland (Sool and Sanaaq) and validated by the parties mentioned above, based on which a final document will be produced. This document presents the working document of the food-fodder system resilience assessment and facilitation tool (FoSRA-F-FT). The FoSRA methodology will be employed by Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI), in close consultation with FAO, to develop food system resilience pathways in Somaliland as part of the REPRO Programme. There are three interrelated parts of the food system resilience assessment: the FoSRA conceptual framework; the FoSRA field assessment (including an extensive training and tool kit); and learning and knowledge management. The FoSRA-FFT will contribute to developing good practice and policy recommendations in building food system resilience in protracted crisis situations from the perspective of the underpinning fodder system.

The Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (FNS-REPRO) is the first programme of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Eastern Africa specifically designed to foster peace and food security at scale. FNS-REPRO employs a livelihood and resilience-based approach in some of the least stable regions, where interventions are normally exclusively of a humanitarian nature. Its design allows FAO and partners to set good examples of how to build food system resilience in protracted crises and strengthen cooperation across the humanitarian-development-peace nexus towards this end. This report provides the results of analyses conducted during FNS-REPRO’s inception phase in Somaliland, with the aim to inform its area based interventions, thereby creating a common understanding of the context, and both the challenges and opportunities therein. The context analysis informs and co-creates design, approaches and operational responses, thereby also strengthening the FNS-REPRO learning agenda and evidence-based programming - focused on seed sector development. The publication provides a baseline for the four-year programme in Somaliland, together with the Resilience Baseline (RIMA) report.

This working document is a collaborative effort between the Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI) of Wageningen University and Research (WUR) and FAO under the Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (FNS-REPRO). The proposed methodology will be field tested in Sudan, South Sudan and Somaliland and validated by the parties mentioned above, based on which a final document will be produced. This guide aims to contribute to FNS-REPRO’s goal to build food system resilience (FSR) in protracted crises, in order to improve food and nutrition security (FNS). It shows how to do this with learning journeys – that is, working with stakeholders to engage and learn in different ways. Learning journeys provide opportunities for stakeholders to learn from each other in an interactive and participatory way. Building FSR requires tailor-made solutions for particular contexts, commodities, systems and actor groups. This means that local knowledge and expertise must be used. There also needs to be good collaboration between everyone involved (including government, UN, NGOs, private sector, local knowledge and research organizations, and civil society at large). The learning journey process is designed to facilitate this. This guide should be used flexibly. It should be adapted to specific needs and situations; specific topics and issues of interest should be central to the learning journey. It is important to know that learning journeys can have different natures, start in different ways, and be used by different actor groups. The FSR learning journeys are designed to create a common ground of concepts, challenges and opportunities to improve practice, and to inform the wider policy environment. They deliberately include a combination of open exploration of current practice and experience, content-specific workshops, and personal assignments. The different kinds of activities enable participants to explore and perhaps shift their dominant working habits. Learning journeys are strongly shaped by their participants. To be successful, they require active participation and open sharing. This guide assumes that a learning journey would be carried out over a flexible period of time, ranging from one week to one year. Depending on the participants, different learning journey paths can be chosen, allowing to tailor-make journeys that are suitable and cover the content. Each learning journey will need to be tailored to the current practices and priorities of the target country. This includes determining which events are suitable when, and selecting the focus content. Each learning journey has a specific topic. This topic needs the buy-in) of all the participants. If the learning journey does not feel relevant, motivation and commitment will decrease. Learning journeys can be designed around a particular learning question stemming from FNS-REPRO or beyond depending on needs and interest of participants. A typical learning journey consists of six parts: 1. a context and needs assessment. This is to understand FSR within the context. It includes identifying key stakeholders who could be involved, and assessing their information and learning needs. 2. a start-up workshop during which a wider group of actors involved in FSR comes together to consider how FSR in protracted crises could be improved through specific learning aspects. 3. a “deep dive” workshop into the content. This should be done through co-creating knowledge (knowledge workshops) and workshops on tools for knowledge (the systems we use to share knowledge). Concepts like food and nutrition security, food systems, resilience or even peace building should be part of this, depending on the learning journey’s exact focus. 4. Exchange and exposure visits with assignments as well as learning from a food system resilience case study – most likely to be a FNS-REPRO element – as long as this aligns with participant interests. 5. An action plan workshop in which progress and pitfalls are shared and steps towards further operationalisation of food system resilience in protracted crises are planned 6. Product development on the basis of all findings. These products can take a wide range of shapes, depending on the exact topic of the learning journey, and can be used by actors to improve practice and policy to build FSR to address food insecurity.

This working document is a collaborative effort between the Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI) of Wageningen University and Research (WUR), Integrated Seed Sector Development in Africa (ISSD-Africa) and FAO South Sudan under the Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (FNS-REPRO). The proposed methodology and tools will be field tested in Torit and Yambio, South Sudan, and validated by the parties mentioned above, based on which a final document will be produced. Building seed system resilience in protracted crises is an important goal of Food and Nutrition Security Resilience Programme (REPRO) South Sudan programme. REPRO South Sudan adopts a food and seed systems approach (FNS) to analyse, understand and promote absorptive, adaptive and transformative seed system resilience capacities in the face of shocks and stressors, in order to improve food and nutrition outcomes. This document presents the working document of the seed system resilience assessment and facilitation tool (SSRA-FT). The SSRA as methodology will be employed by Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI), in close consultation with FAO, to develop seed system resilience pathways in South Sudan as part of the REPRO Programme. There are three interrelated parts of the seed system resilience assessment: the SSRA conceptual framework; undertaking the SSRA; and the SSRA toolbox. The SSRA-FT will contribute to developing good practice and policy recommendations in two important domains: building seed system resilience in protracted crises, and seed distribution in emergencies.

In 2022, the world faced multiple crises. Disruptions to food systems from the protracted COVID-19 pandemic, major natural disasters, civil unrest and political instability, and the growing impacts of climate change continued, as the Russia-Ukraine war and inflation exacerbated a global food and fertilizer crisis. The growing number of crises, their increasing impact, and rising numbers of hungry and displaced people have galvanized calls to rethink responses to food crises, creating a real opportunity for change.

Armed conflict combined with prolonged drought has put about 20 million people at risk of starvation and death in Somalia, South Sudan, Yemen, and northern Nigeria. The international development and aid communities are caught between the enormity of the humanitarian crisis, which demands an estimated US$4.4 billion to address, and the lack of resources forthcoming from donors. Food crises, famine-like conditions, and famines recur with regularity in many developing countries (see Box 1 for definitions of terms). Although the current famines can be largely attributed to conflicts, chronic food insecurity also threatens several other African countries. For example, 6.7 million people were affected by Malawi’s largest food crisis in decades in 2016–2017, and the country remains vulnerable to weather extremes that could create food emergencies (World Bank 2017). In Kenya, food security has deteriorated since the end of 2016 and half of its 47 counties face food shortages (Chatterjee and Mengistu 2017). How do countries prepare to prevent shocks—natural and man-made—from generating food crises? What does it take to break the cycle of chronic food insecurity and build resilient food systems? How have some countries managed to prevent drought from leading to famine? In this brief, we document lessons for building resilient food systems to prevent future famines.

In this paper we undertake an analytical review of the extant literature on the building food system resilience. While the concept of food system resilience has become a topical issue in global and national policy discussion, there is little research on how to develop operational procedures to design and implement interventions from the food system and resilience perspective. This review identifies five major entry points to strengthen food system resilience in the national context: policy, institutions, technology, capacity, and governance. Measurement issues and analytical approaches to studying food system resilience are reviewed. We conclude that while there is a large gap in the methodological approaches to study the food system resilience, beginning with the case studies of understanding specific elements of a food system and their role in enhancing resilience would be good starting point for addressing thematic issues, challenges and constraints facing resilience of the food systems.

As part of the work implemented by CGIAR on COVID-19, the COVID-19 Research Hub Working Group 4 “Address food systems’ fragility and build back better” was tasked with implementing a global assessment of the impacts of COVID-19 on food systems and their actors, focusing specifically on the consequences that the pandemic had brought on the food security and nutrition of those who have been affected by the crisis. This includes formal and informal actors of the food supply chains (from producers to street vendors) as well as consumers, in both rural and urban environments. Building on this assessment, the task was then to draw on key principles of resilience in the context of humanitarian and food security crisis, to identify preliminary elements of a food system resilience research agenda.

Food systems in Eastern Equatoria State, South Sudan, are in dire crisis because of multiple shocks and stressors, persisting conflict and violence, climate change, and natural resource deterioration. However, building upon South Sudan’s National Food Systems Dialogue ample opportunities exist to build food systems resilience in EE through strengthening the capacity of people to produce and access nutritious and culturally acceptable food over time and space in the face of natural and/or man-made shocks and stressors. This report provides a rationale for building food systems resilience in South Sudan by introducing its concept and operationalisation (part 1 of this report), presenting the main findings of the food systems resilience dialogue that took place in EE State (part 2), and introducing the main pathways identified to build food systems resilience in the State (part 3). Food systems approaches are increasingly seen as a way forward to develop sustainable food systems in protracted food crisis as highlighted by the UN Food Systems Summit, the Global Network Against Food Crises and the Fighting Food Crises along the Nexus Coalition. It is therefore most opportune to act now by investing in an urgently needed transformation towards equitable, inclusive, and sustainable food systems for improved outcomes, in particular food and nutrition security in protracted food crises contexts. For South Sudan this means, in line with the outcomes of its National Food Systems Dialogue, to address four strategic challenges to transform the country’s food systems: 1) strengthening the resilience of food systems in face of current and future shocks and stressors; 2) developing food systems that contribute to social cohesion and peace; 3) ensuring that food systems are based on sustainable use and management of natural resources and produce healthier diets, and; 4) promoting sustainable food supply systems through inclusive value chains and agribusinesses with an eye on youth employment. Governance of food systems takes place at multiple levels and scales but transformation of local food systems will only succeed if communities, civil society organisations, small producers, farmers, and indigenous groups – with their local knowledge, and lived-in experiences – can shape how food is governed. The EE’s Food Systems Resilience Dialogue & Pathway Development (FoSReD-PaD) provides an approach to strengthen local governance of food systems for improved food systems resilience and outcomes. The State-Level Dialogue envisaged a total of nine pathways which together form a roadmap to transform EE’s food systems to become more resilient; better serve the needs of all stakeholders (in particular smallholder farmers/agri-pastoralists and herders); and improve food and nutrition outcomes for all.

This booklet is directed towards FAO Member States, UN system and all other potential partners, and sheds light on the role that resilient agriculture livelihoods can play in addressing some of the root causes of migration in protracted crises and assisting displaced populations and host communities to cope with protracted displacement. The document aims at improving understanding of migration in situations of protracted crisis by explaining the context and providing examples of the work that FAO, together with its partners, has been doing across different countries to strengthen the resilience of communities and leave no one behind before, during and after protracted crises.