event 16 Nov 2020 time 19:00 UTC

Event // Food Security and Climate Change

This event is organized by the Oxford Climate Society. It will address the impact of climate change on food security and the techniques that can be implemented to build resilient agricultural production systems, with a particular focus on regenerative agriculture.

Food and Climate Change Event

November 16 // 7pm - 8pm UTC

“The decades-long decline in hunger in the world has ended” – UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2020.

Since 2014, the FAO has registered an increase in undernourishment in the world. In 2019, 25.9% of the world population faced moderate or severe levels of food insecurity with the most rapid increase in Latin American, the Caribbean and Africa. This increase was mostly tied with the outbreak of conflicts and economic shocks, but another threat is looming on the close horizon.

Increasing climate risks – such as irregular rainfall, increased incidences of storms, prolonged droughts and intensive heat waves – are already affecting food production, pest infestations and the spread of disease and insects. These particularly affect small-scale farmers who don’t have the financial or technical ability to invest in advanced irrigation systems, drought resistant seeds, or synthetic fertilisers.

How to support these farmers and the communities which rely on their yields? What technology can we implement to build resilient agricultural systems? Can alternative methods support this transition?

To discuss these questions, we will be joined by Professor Timothy LaSalle and Dr Zitouni Ould-Dada.

Timothy LaSalle has served as the first CEO of Rodale Institute, Executive Director of the Allan Savory Center for Holistic Management, consultant, advisor, and research coordinator for the Howard Buffett Foundation in Africa on soils and food security for smallholder farmers. He is Professor Emeritus of California Polytechnic State University, and former President/CEO, of the California Agriculture Leadership Program where he arranged educational leadership programs in more than 80 countries with heads of state, ministers, and community leaders.

Dr. Zitouni Ould-Dada is currently Deputy Director in the Office of Climate Change, Biodiversity and Environment at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in Rome. Before joining FAO, he worked as Head of Technology Unit at UNEP in Paris for 5 years. Prior to that, he worked for the British Government for 15 years holding several senior positions at the Department of Energy and Climate Change; Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Food Standards Agency; Environment Agency; and Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food. He also worked for the French Government on international climate change during France Presidency of the European Union in 2008.

Registration

You can register for the event here.

Live-Stream on YouTube

This event will be live-streamed at the Oxford Climate Society YouTube channel.

The exact link will be posted when the event starts at 7pm.

Speakers

You can find more about the speakers at the following links:

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