Miscellaneous themes
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12348/719
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- This factsheet provides an introduction and brief statistics for WorldFish repositories, the Digital Archive and WorldFish Dataverse. Numbers shown in this factsheet will be updated yearly for ease of reference. The WorldFish Digital Archive and WorldFish Dataverse are essential resources developed by WorldFish researchers. These platforms host verified publications and findings dating back to the 1970s offering a comprehensive repository of historical and contemporary insights into global fisheries and aquaculture.
- The production and consumption of food is one of the main drivers of environmental change globally. Meanwhile, many populations remain malnourished due to insufficient or unhealthy diets. Increasingly, dietary shifts are proposed as a means to address both environmental and health concerns. We have a limited understanding of how dietary shifts could alter where food is produced and consumed and how these changes would affect the distribution of environmental pressures both globally and across different groups of people. Here we combine new food flow data linking producing to consuming country with environmental pressures to estimate how a global shift to each of four diets (Indian, EAT-Lancet, Mediterranean, and mean Food Based Dietary Guidelines (FBDGs)) could affect environmental pressures at the global, country income group, and country level. Globally, cumulative pressures decrease under the Indian, EAT-Lancet, and Mediterranean scenarios and increase under FBDGs. On average, low income countries increase their cumulative consumption and production pressures while high income countries decrease their consumption pressures, and typically decrease their production pressures. Increases in low income countries are likely due to the nutritional inadequacy of current diets and the corresponding increases in consumption quantities with a shift to our diet scenarios. Despite these increases, we believe that three out four of our simulated dietary shifts can be seen as a net benefit by decreasing global pressures while low income countries increase pressures to adequately feed their populations. Additionally, considering principles of fairness applied, some nations are more responsible for causing historical environmental pressures and should shoulder more of the change. To facilitate more equitable shifts in global diets, resources, capacity, and knowledge sharing of sustainable agricultural practices are critical to minimize the increases in pressures that low income countries would incur to adequately feed their populations.
- Although researchers are committed to Indigenous data sovereignty in principle, they fall short in returning data and results to communities in which or with whom they conduct their research. This results in a misalignment in benefits of research toward researchers and settler institutions and away from Indigenous communities. To explore this, we conducted a case study analyzing the rate researchers returned data to Nunatsiavut, an autonomous area claimed by Inuit of Labrador, Canada. We assessed the data return rate for all research approved by the Nunatsiavut Government Research Advisory Committee between 2011 and 2021. In two-thirds of projects, researchers did not return the data they had collected. Based on our results and their contextualization with researchers and Nunatsiavut Research Centre staff members, we compiled recommendations for researchers, academia, government bodies, funding bodies, and Indigenous research governance boards. These recommendations aim to facilitate data return, thus putting data sovereignty into practice.
- Blue or aquatic foods—foods that are wild-caught or farmed from oceans, rivers, and lakes—are an important part of global food systems. They are increasingly recognized as a priority for climate action, yet they are often overlooked in climate discussions and underfunded in mitigation and adaptation financing. Addressing climate impacts on aquatic food systems and leveraging their potential for climate action requires their integration into national climate strategies and UNFCCC processes. Climate decision-makers have an opportunity to use growing momentum and insights on blue foods to develop concrete policy strategies that can support a thriving blue food sector in the face of climate change. These guidelines are designed for audiences working on nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and other climate strategies. They offer diverse entry points for employing blue foods in climate solutions and are intended to be a starting point for setting targets and developing policies related to blue foods in climate action, offering a framework rather than an exhaustive list of actions. Policymakers can adapt these policy options to NDCs as well as consider their relevance in other areas of climate planning, including water and waste management, energy, nutrition, and economic development. The policy options outlined in these guidelines are organized into five intervention areas. In addition, we offer four enabling measures that can strengthen the implementation and monitoring of aquatic food climate solutions.
- Agriculture is a key sector in Cambodia, accounting for 22% of GDP in 2022, with 57% of households engaged in agricultural production. The vast majority of these households (94%) are involved in crop cultivation, primarily non-aromatic paddy rice, followed by mango and banana crops. Livestock and poultry farming are also significant, with 82% of farmers participating. However, aquaculture is practiced by only 6% of agricultural households. The sector remains vital for food security, despite its declining share in GDP because of structural changes in the economy. This study focuses on five provinces, examining household agricultural activities, including crop cultivation, livestock management, and aquaculture, based on a survey conducted in mid-2023. The objective is to comprehensively assess the productivity of agricultural households in Cambodia and to evaluate the nutrient content produced by their agricultural outputs.
- From Fragility to Resilience in Central and West Asia and North Africa (F2R-CWANA), presentation for the Inception Workshop – Morocco May 17, 2022
- Fish represent an important part of the Sri Lankan and Bangladeshi diet. However, fish is also a source of contaminants that may constitute a health risk to consumers. The aim of this study was to analyse the contents of arsenic, cadmium, mercury, and lead in 24 commonly consumed marine fish species from the Bay of Bengal and to assess the potential health risk associated with their consumption. Mercury and lead contents did not exceed the maximum limits for any of the sampled species, and consumer exposure from estimated daily consumption was assessed to be minimal for adults and children. Numerous samples exceeded the maximum limit for cadmium (58%), particularly those of small size (≤25 cm). However, consumer exposure was insignificant, and health assessment showed no risk connected to consumption. These data represent an important contribution to future risk/benefit assessments related to the consumption of fish.
- Cumming, G.; Adamska, M.; Barnes, M.; Barnett, J.; Bellwood, D.R.; Cinner, J.; Cohen, P.J.; Donelson, J.M.; Fabricius, K.; Grafton, Q.; Grech, A.; Gurney, G.; Hoegh-Guldberg, O.; Hoey, A.S.; Hoogenboom, M.O.; Lau, J.; Lovelock, C.E.; Lowe, R.; Miller, D.J.; Morrison, T.; Mumby, P.J.; Nakata, M.; Pandolfi, J.M.; Peterson, G.D.; Pratchett, M.S.; Ravasi, T.; Riginos, C.; Rummer, J.L.; Schaffelke, B.; Wilson, S.K.Nearly a billion people depend on tropical seascapes. The need to ensure sustainable use of these vital areas is recognised, as one of 17 policy commitments made by world leaders, in Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 (‘Life below Water’) of the United Nations. SDG 14 seeks to secure marine sustainability by 2030. In a time of increasing social-ecological unpredictability and risk, scientists and policymakers working towards SDG 14 in the Asia–Pacific region need to know: (1) How are seascapes changing? (2) What can global society do about these changes? and (3) How can science and society together achieve sustainable seascape futures? Through a horizon scan, we identified nine emerging research priorities that clarify potential research contributions to marine sustainability in locations with high coral reef abundance. They include research on seascape geological and biological evolution and adaptation; elucidating drivers and mechanisms of change; understanding how seascape functions and services are produced, and how people depend on them; costs, benefits, and trade-offs to people in changing seascapes; improving seascape technologies and practices; learning to govern and manage seascapes for all; sustainable use, justice, and human well-being; bridging communities and epistemologies for innovative, equitable, and scale-crossing solutions; and informing resilient seascape futures through modelling and synthesis. Researchers can contribute to the sustainability of tropical seascapes by co-developing transdisciplinary understandings of people and ecosystems, emphasising the importance of equity and justice, and improving knowledge of key cross-scale and cross-level processes, feedbacks, and thresholds.
- In the discourse about the development of farmed animal production (terrestrial livestock production and aquaculture) in the tropics, two important food system outcomes emerge: (1) to supply animal-sourced food (ASF) at a level that suffices healthy future diets, including for poor people, and (2) to contribute to climate change mitigation and minimize pollution with nitrogen and phosphorus. Livestock production and aquaculture contribute to food security directly by increasing producers’ food diversity and availability, but also that of urban consumers, and indirectly through income generation and increased farm resilience. Recently, circularity has come to the fore as an integrated approach to food system development. Circularity has four cornerstones: (1) food crops have highest priority (which implies no food-feed competition), (2) avoid losses, (3) recycle waste and (4) use animals to unlock biomass that humans cannot eat. In this review, the role of farmed animals in circular food systems in the tropics is presented in four case studies and the impacts of circularity on food security and environmental impact mitigation are discussed. The cases are ruminants in grazing systems in West Africa and in Colombia, fish in pond aquaculture in general, and land-limited dairy production in Indonesia. Additionally, options for novel protein sources for use in livestock and fish feeding are presented. It is concluded that farmed animals are important in circular food systems because of their use of land unsuited for crop production, their upgrading of crop residues, and their supply of manure to crop production. Nevertheless, the increasing demand for ASF puts pressure on important characteristics of circularity, such as minimizing food-feed competition, maximization of use of waste streams in feed, and the value of manure for fertilization. Hence, in line with conclusions for Western countries, maximum circularity and sustainability of food systems can only be achieved by optimizing the population size of animals. Thus, a sustainable contribution of ASF production to global food security is complex and in not only a technical matter or outcome of an economic process balancing supply and demand. It requires governance for which public, private, and social actors need to partner.
- Youth livelihoods in food-systems are increasingly the focus of development institutions, drawing attention to how the livelihood aspirations of young people shape their engagements with food-systems. This study sought to understand the livelihood aspirations of young people from a historically poor and marginalized fishing community in the Ayeyarwady Delta of Myanmar, and how these aspirations shaped livelihood realities.
- Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are widely used tools for conserving coastal and marine biodiversity and ecosystem health. However, the goal of declaring and managing at least 10 % of coastal and marine waters as MPAs has not been achieved in Bangladesh and many other countries. This study aimed at prioritizing the potential areas for MPA delineation in the south-west coastal zone of Bangladesh. The study also examined the socio-economic status, environmental and ecological characteristics of the study areas. Data on socio-economic, environmental, ecological, and management variables were collected through intensive field surveys from August 2023 to December 2023. The data were integrated using a multi-criteria analytical technique. Fishing was identified as the primary occupation for all fishermen surveyed, with secondary occupations including fish selling, marketing, and drying activities. The fishing areas for fishermen from the three survey sites were mainly concentrated in the offshore area. All three areas were identified as biodiversity hotspots, with Kuakata coast showing the highest species diversity, followed by Salimpur and Sandwip coasts. The study revealed that the Kuakata coast has the highest conservation importance, especially for IUCN red-listed species, juvenile fisheries species, and megafauna species. Salimpur coast is important for the conservation of saltmarshes, mangroves, and their dependent communities, while Sandwip is crucial for juvenile fish species conservation. Based on socio-ecological criteria, Kuakata was recommended as the most potential site for MPA delineation, followed by Salimpur and Sandwip. Implementing these recommendations can improve the management and execution of existing MPAs by focusing conservation efforts on areas with the highest biodiversity and ecological importance, ensuring better protection for vulnerable species, and enhancing the sustainability of local fishing communities. This, in turn, will ultimately enhance biodiversity conservation and ecosystem health in the southwest coastal area of Bangladesh.
- The livelihood framework is an essential concept in the development theory. Livelihoods vary among places, cultures, religions, and ethnic groups. A bulk of the literature discusses the livelihoods, but many focus on land-based livelihood frameworks, and a few look into the water-based livelihood system. The increased use of water for increased development and climate change has affected the livelihoods of millions of people. This study examines the water-based livelihood system and how it has been affected by increased development pressure and climate change. In answering this question, the study undertakes the reviews of literature and the case studies of livelihoods in Tonle Sap Lake (TSL). It concludes that the flood pulse of TSL shapes three categories of communities and their livelihoods and assets. Hydropower operations and climate change have altered the flows, volumes, inundation, productivity, and livelihoods. The structures and processes at national, regional, and global levels have influenced the livelihoods and governance of TSL. Further, the regional development programs and cooperation frameworks have impacted the structures and processes, the hydrological regimes, and the livelihoods of local people. These changes have made local communities unable to adapt and resilient to these changes and have forcibly transformed them to resort to non-fishing livelihoods, including agriculture and migration.
- The Plan of Results and Budget (PORB) is a planning tool for CGIAR’s Initiatives and Impact Platform Budgets. It outlines annual results against estimated resources, supporting monitoring and reporting. Results are detailed by Work Packages and Implementing Centers, linked to approved budgets, and provide a timeline for achieving yearly goals.
- CGIAR Technical Reporting has been developed in alignment with the CGIAR Technical Reporting Arrangement. This Initiative report is a Type 1 report and constitutes part of the broader CGIAR Technical Report. Each CGIAR Initiative submits an annual Type 1 report, which provides assurance on Initiative-level progress towards End of Initiative outcomes.
- The CGIAR Technical Report includes Type 1 Initiative, Impact Platform, and Science Group Project reports with results on the CGIAR Results Dashboard, the Type 3 Portfolio Performance and Project Coordination Practice Change report focusing on internal practice changes, and the Portfolio Narrative, which combines insights from these reports to provide a comprehensive view of portfolio coherence, results, partnerships, regional engagement, and synergies.
- The Plan of Results and Budget (PORB) is a planning tool used with CGIAR’s Initiatives and Impact Platform Budgets to outline annual results based on estimated resources. It supports monitoring and reporting by detailing results from the Theory of Change, broken down by Work Packages and Implementing Centers, and linked to approved budgets, providing an overview of resources and timelines for achieving annual goals.
- This Results Framework (RF) is based on the updated WorldFish (WF)’s Theory of Change (ToC) version in May 2023. The RF is built around a conceptual framework that focuses on determining the extent to which there is control over research results and contribution to development impacts. This document covers the details at all the above-mentioned levels as well as identifying roles and responsibilities and the ways of tracking the different outputs and outcomes. The high-level indicators were endorsed in 2023, during the annual retreat, taking reference of CGIAR indicators. This document also helps to identify (a) how the framework is operationalised and, (b) the key MEL activities and timelines to ensure the improvement of the program quality and efficiency of WF. For the full result framework table please refer to Annex 1, which provides more details of how each indicator will be reported, ways of segregation and aggregation, and frequency of data collection.
- Cambodia, like many other low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), is undergoing a significant dietary shift. National data shows a decrease in the share of household expenditure on food over the past two decades, accompanied by an increase in purchased food items and food prepared away from home, indicative of a diet transformation. In this context, the rural economy relies heavily on informal food vendors and small-town market sellers, whose role is crucial yet often overlooked, particularly in rural areas. These vendors provide convenient access to a diverse range of affordable foods, including fresh produce, cooked meals, and ultra-processed snacks. However, this shift in consumption patterns, from home-cooked meals to food outside the home and readily available ultra-processed foods, poses nutritional challenges at both household and population levels, contributing to the phenomenon known as nutrition transition. CGIAR Initiative on Securing the Food Systems of Asian Mega-Deltas for Climate and Livelihood Resilience (AMD) has conducted and urban food vendor survey in Cambodia. This is a poster presentation on the study titled ''Changing diets and the role of rural food vendors in Cambodia''.
- This report outlines the financial statements and report of independent auditors for the year ended December 31, 2023
- Standard tools that can quantitatively track the impacts of higher global demand for animal-sourced food to their local environmental effects in developing countries are largely missing. This paper presents a novel integrated assessment framework that links a model of the global agricultural and food system, a landscape-level environmental impact assessment model, and an ecosystem services simulation model. For Tanzania, this integrated assessment showed that a projected increase in the demand and production of foods of livestock origin with optimistic economic growth between 2010 and 2030 leads to an improvement in food security. However, resulting transitions in land use impact negatively on the future provisioning of ecosystem services, increasing phosphorus, nitrogen, and sediment in runoff and reducing water quality in areas downstream of the agricultural expansion. Losses in ecosystem services are lowest when diversified farming practices are adopted in areas of agricultural land expansion. The role of land management in the environmental impacts of expanded livestock production is highlighted, as is the need for a new generation of analytical tools to inform policy recommendations.