agriculture

Like this farmer in Kenya, the challenge in Tanzania is connecting smallholder farmers to larger markets. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ciat/5366702717/sizes/z/">CIAT International Center for Tropical Agriculture</a>

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Value Chains

How a Tanzania NGO scrapped grants to build markets that last

When it comes to solving poverty, sometimes the best way to get more done is to move out of the driver's seat.

A farmer in Manthralaya, India plows his field. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/58925091@N00/136310496/">Ananth BS (Flickr)</a>

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Value Chains

Farmers invest 50 times more in farms than their countries get in aid

Crops resilient to climate change are especially important to farmers in developing countries. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/cimmyt/5210265334/">CIMMYT (Flickr)</a>.

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Value Chains

As climate becomes a moving target, 'virtual crops' aim for the future

Climate change is threatening crop survival. Some researchers believe the solution lies in "virtual crops."

Left: Patricia Wolff, founder and executive director of Meds and Food for Kids. (Photo: MFK.) Right: Paul Farmer, founder and executive director of Partners in Health. (Photo: <a href="http://flic.kr/p/csKJu9">Nyaya Health, Flickr</a>.)

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Social Enterprise

Devil take the hindmost? Haiti peanut battle puts NGOs head to head

When antipoverty nonprofits compete, it's not always clear who will lose more: the one whose business is threatened, or the people both nonprofits set out to serve.

Filipino farmers plant rice. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/20119750@N00/2680751025/">Schubert Ciencia (Flickr)</a>

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Social Enterprise

On World Food Day, praise for a humble business structure: The co-op

For agriculture cooperatives, this year’s World Food Day has been a day in the sun.

Those mangroves aren't just nice-looking - they could be delivering serious value to nearby farms just by staying put. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/aramisfirefly/3306656930/in/photostream/">Matthew Stewart (Flickr)</a>

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10 African countries will put a price on 'natural capital'

A plot of mangroves could be harvested for $850, then the land sold for $9,000 to a shrimp farmer. Or, alternatively, it could stay standing and offer $16,000 worth of flood protection to everyone nearby.

One-third of all food produced for human consumption never makes it to the table. Photo: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/sunnyshine80/5042513304/sizes/m/in/photostream/">SSTUDIO Samuel Bietenholz (Flickr)</a>.

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Why agricultural research should not end with the harvest

This article was republished on The Christian Science Monitor.

A crowded market in Dhaka, Bangaldesh. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ifpri/4860343116/"> IFPRI</a>

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How to make population growth work for Africa

Sub-Saharan Africa is getting bigger. But despite warnings from neo-Malthusian alarmists, population growth—if managed correctly—could be the key to unlocking Africa’s economic potential.

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Five clear steps we can take to fight food insecurity

Four years after a global crisis sent food prices soaring, the world continues to struggle with hunger and food price volatility. To combat global hunger, we clearly need a new strategy.

Nigerian farmers will soon be receiving vouchers for seeds and fertilizer on their mobile phones. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/32348003@N02/5348965590/">IICD (Flickr)</a>

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Nigeria uses mobile phones to fight corruption in farm subsidies

Farmers of Nigeria, check your phones: You've got ... subsidies.

Genetically modified foods offer both promise and controversy. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/joost-ijmuiden/5574397082/in/faves-76630889@N05/">Joost J. Bakker IJmuiden (Flickr)</a>

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Bill Gates to world: 'Eat your GMOs. They're good for you.'

For decades, the term “genetically modified organism” has sounded like something inherently inedible. But a loud new voice is replying that the world should eat up anyway.

Mariama Zachary and Akua Azaiz tend to cocoa beans on a drying table in Ghana. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/48639212@N02/5574716960/">Gates Foundation (flickr)</a>

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G-20 Searches for Answers to Food Crisis

Food prices are exceeding record highs—prompting policymakers worldwide to take action. A recent meeting of the G-20 agriculture ministers has given reason for hope, but many obstacles to less expensive food remain.

Youth finish work on an embankment to hold back floodwaters in Borini Sharifow, a small farming village in Jamame district, Somalia. Photo: Mohamed Jama/ Mercy Corps

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A second scramble for Africa?

"The African continent is going to be the golden continent of the period," raves a business leader at the 2011 World Economic Forum in Davos.

Iraq's most lucrative export after oil - dates - has seen declining production since the American-led invasion began in 2003. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ikhlasulamal/3542981557/">Ikhlasul Amal (flickr)</a>

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Declining Dates in Iraq

The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the subsequent violence has left the country struggling to survive. Now, Iraq’s economy is suffering even more due to declining production in one of its most thriving exports after oil: dates.

Canned vegetables distributed by USAID on grocery store shelves in Ethiopia. Re-selling aid is a problem for countries sending food instead of buying it locally. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/se-a-vida-e/3203087587/">Manogamo (flickr)</a>

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Thoughts on Obama's food security initiative

The old saying goes that if you give a man a fish he eats for a day but if you teach him to fish he eats for life. If such a program were run by the current U.S.