Food problems are the order of the day. Solving the problems of hunger and malnutrition, producing and guaranteeing access to healthy food, preserving the environment, valuing local cultures and ensuring citizen participation are some of the many challenges that permeate the dynamics of food systems. This book addresses the role of Latin American public policies and actions in the configuration of healthy and sustainable food systems. Written by scholars specialized in various disciplines (economy, sociology, policy science, etc.) and hailing from ten Latin American countries, it provides a historical overview of national food policies, examines recent policy changes and explores innovative urban and rural experiences at local level. The authors also discuss the challenges of developing specific policy objectives related to sustainable food systems. This book shows how référentiels for public food policies have become more integrated in Latin America and takes a closer look at several promising local initiatives. However, it also highlights the many constraints in fostering sustainable food systems in the region, such as persistent competition among production models, land tenure inequalities and coordination issues among actors and state bodies. It will be of interest to a scientific audience of teachers and food systems professionals, as well as any readers interested in policy dynamics in Latin America.

The book has been prepared by authors from different international organizations – including FAO, IFPRI, UNCTAD and ECLAC, as well as legislators and academics from prestigious Latin American universities – seeking to foster reflections for the Global Food Systems Summit, to be held in September 2021. It contextualizes the region’s food systems within a post COVID-19 pandemic scenario and raises new challenges (and opportunities) for policy makers, decision makers, the private sector, and the general public. Likewise, it offers important reflections on sustainability, from production to consumption, with the call to promote better governance of the global and regional food system. In order to face what some authors have deemed “the Syndemic of the century”, the participation of companies, research centres, academia, NGOs, government agencies and international organizations will be necessary.

Food Systems in an Unequal World examines regulatory risk and how it translates to and impacts farmers in Costa Rica. Ryan E. Galt shows how the food produced for domestic markets lacks regulation similar to that of export markets, creating a dangerous double standard of pesticide use.

Campesino a Campesino tells the inspiring story of a true grassroots movement: poor peasant farmers teaching one another how to protect their environment while still earning a living. The first book in English about the farmer-led sustainable agriculture movement in Latin America, Campesino a Campesino includes lots of first-person stories and commentary from the farmer-teachers, mixing personal accounts with detailed analysis of the political, socioeconomic, and ecological factors that galvanized the movement. Campesino farmer leading a farmer to farmer training session in Mexico by Eric Holt-GimenezMany years ago, author Eric Holt-Gim�nez was a volunteer trying to teach sustainable agriculture techniques in the dusty highlands of central Mexico, with little success. Near the end of his tenure, he invited a group of visiting Guatemalan farmers to teach a course in his village. What he saw was like nothing he had known. The Guatemalans used parables, stories, and humor to present agricultural improvement to their Mexican compadres as a logical outcome of clear thinking and compassion; love of farming, of family, of nature, and of community. Rather than try to convince the Mexicans of their innovations, they insisted they experiment new things on a small scale first to see how well they worked. And they saw themselves as students, respecting the Mexicans' deep, lifelong knowledge of their own particular land and climate. All they asked in return was that the Mexicans turn around and share their new knowledge with others--which they did. CAC campo3_photo by Food FirstThis exchange was typical of a grassroots movement called Campesino a Campesino, or Farmer to Farmer, which has grown up in southern Mexico and war-torn Central America over the last three decades. In the book Campesino a Campesino, Holt-Gim�nez writes the first history of the movement, describing the social, political, economic, and environmental circumstances that shape it. The voices and stories of dozens of farmers in the movement are captured, bringing to vivid life this hopeful story of peasant farmers helping one another to farm sustainably, protecting their land, their environment, and their families' future.

Why write a book on macroeconomic policies and their links to agriculture and food security in developing countries? The food price spikes of the years just prior to 2010 and the economic, political, and social dislocations they generated refocused the attention of policymakers and development practitioners on the agricultural sector and food security concerns. But even without those traumatic events, the importance of agriculture for developing countries—and for an adequate functioning of the world economy— cannot be denied. First, although declining over time, primary agriculture still represents important percentages of developing countries’ overall domestic production, exports, and employment. If agroindustrial, transportation, commercial, and other related activities are also counted, then the economic and social importance of agriculture-based sectors increases significantly. Furthermore, large numbers of the world’s poor still live in rural areas and work in agriculture. Through the links via production, trade, employment, and prices, agricultural production is also crucial for national food security. Second, it has been shown that agriculture in developing countries has important growth and employment multipliers for the rest of the economy, and agriculture seems to have larger positive effects in reducing poverty than growth in other sectors. Third, agriculture is not only important for individual developing countries, but it has global significance, considering the large presence of developing countries in world agricultural production and the increasing participation in international trade of those products (these three points will be covered in greater detail in Chapter 1).

The International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science, and Technology for Development (IAASTD) looks realistically at how we could effectively use agriculture/AKST to help us meet development and sustainability goals. An unprecedented three-year collaborative effort, the IAASTD involved more than 400 authors in 110 countries and cost more than $11 million. It reports on the advances and setbacks of the past fifty years and offers options for the next fifty years. The results of the project are contained in seven reports: a Global Report, five regional Sub-Global Assessments, and a Synthesis Report. The Global Report gives the key findings of the Assessment, and the five Sub-Global Assessments address regional challenges. The volumes present options for action. All of the reports have been extensively peer-reviewed by governments and experts and all have been approved by a panel of participating governments. The Sub-Global Assessments all utilize a similar and consistent framework: examining and reporting on the impacts of AKST on hunger, poverty, nutrition, human health, and environmental/social sustainability. The five Sub-Global Assessments cover the following regions: Central and West Asia and North Africa (CWANA) East and South Asia and the Pacific (ESAP) Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) North America and Europe (NAE) Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)

This document represents a joint effort between two action networks of the Global Agenda: (i) Closing the Efficiency Gap and (ii) the Global Network on Silvopastoral Systems. A framework for evaluating natural resource use efficiency is applied to a variety of silvopastoral production models to determine productivity and their socio-economic and environmental benefits. It presents an overview of SPS, their main characteristics and advantages regarding production and benefits for the environment and climate, and their contribution to the SDGs, describing the results of ten case studies of adoption of SPS in diverse contexts in Colombia, Mexico, and Argentina, with a focus on land productivity, meat and milk production, and economic performance at the farm level. Based on the findings, a number of policy recommendations are made with a view to scaling-up and promoting SPS in Latin America and other regions.

Examines the problem of inedequate access to information and communication technology (ICT) and the need to develop appropriate pro-poor ICT policies. Shows how market reforms have failed to ensure that the benefits of the Information Society have spread across the region.

Governments, nongovernmental organizations, donors, and the private sector have increasingly embraced value-chain development (VCD) for stimulating economic growth and combating rural poverty. Innovation for Inclusive Value-Chain Development: Successes and Challenges helps to fill the current gap in systematic knowledge about how well VCD has performed, related trade-offs or undesired effects, and which combinations of VCD elements are most likely to reduce poverty and deliver on overall development goals. This book uses case studies to examine a range of VCD experiences. Approaching the subject from various angles, it looks at new linkages to markets and the role of farmer organizations and contract farming in raising productivity and access to markets, the minimum assets requirement to participate in VCD, the role of multi-stakeholder platforms in VCD, and how to measure and identify successful VCD interventions. The book also explores the challenges livestock-dependent people face; how urbanization and advancing technologies affect linkages; ways to increase gender inclusion and economic growth; and the different roles various types of platforms play in VCD.

On 23 September 2021, the Food Systems Summit convened by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, was held. Latin America and the Caribbean played an essential role in this event. The official proposals and recommendations presented at the Summit are part of the official reports of the national dialogues and the speeches of their official representatives. In this publication, we reproduce the transcripts of these 23 speeches. This publication is an invitation to those who want to learn about Latin America and the Caribbean proposals at the Summit.