Academic article

This article, published in the Agricultural Systems journal, uses data from 500 households in Samburu County (Kenya) to explore how natural environment and market accessibility affect coping and adaptation strategies of pastoralists. In particular, the authors ask whether households accumulate livestock wealth and invest in structural and cognitive social capital to protect themselves against climate risks. »

This study in the Agricultural Systems Journal identifies entry points for innovation for sustainable intensification of agricultural systems. An agricultural innovation systems approach is used to provide a holistic image of (relations between) constraints faced by different stakeholder groups, the dimensions and causes of these constraints, and intervention levels, timeframes and types of innovations needed. The data shows that constraints for sustainable intensification of agricultural systems are mainly of economic and institutional nature. »

This paper, published in the Outlook on Agriculture journal, provides an overview and analysis of vegetable seed industries in developing countries, with a focus on Morocco, and the resulting influences on smaller subsistence farmers. The ongoing problems and issues related to the absence of vegetable seed industries in developing countries will undoubtedly affect food production, nutritional health and the resulting food security in these countries for future generations. »

In this article in the Environmental Research Letters, a complementary approach to existing approaches of assessing the sustainability of commodity supply chains is introduced. This approach can help provide actionable information, for example to improve sourcing and production practices, without requiring costly dedicated tracking systems for each individual supply chain. »

This article investigates several policy strategies to protect domestic food security through reducing food losses. The study scrutinizes three policy responses to rising world food prices in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. »

This paper in the Journal of Rural Studies operationalizes the concept of social wellbeing (comprised of interlinked material, subjective and relational dimensions) as a framework for understanding the effects of agrarian change, as experienced by inhabitants of two villages in rural Southwest Bangladesh. Production of two ostensibly similar high value export crops (tiger shrimp and freshwater prawn) resulted in radically different trajectories of agrarian change and social wellbeing outcomes in the two villages. »