17th CGIAR System Council Meeting

2 - 3 November 2022. 17th CGIAR System Council Meeting

The 17th CGIAR System Council meeting (SC17) will take place in Brisbane, Australia on 2-3 November 2022 with associated events taking place from Monday 31 October, including the TropAg and the Harlan IV Conferences and an ACIAR-led fieldtrip on Friday 4 November.

‘Initiative Briefs’ (replacing Initiative proposal documents) have been prepared following the 6-month ‘inception phase’ of all CGIAR Initiatives, and the content of these is now available at the following page: https://www.cgiar.org/research/cgiar-portfolio/initiatives-explorer/

Should a pdf copy of any of the individual Initiative Briefs be required, these are available for download via this link.

1. Fruits and Vegetables
   
   
   This Initiative aims to use an end-to-end approach to increase fruit and vegetable intake and in turn improve diet quality, nutrition and health outcomes while also improving livelihoods, empowering women and youth and mitigating negative environmental impacts.
   
   
   
   
2. Low-Emission Food Systems
   
   
   This Initiative aims to reduce annual global food systems emissions by 7% by 2030 by working closely with key actors in the target countries to ensure they are equipped to make evidence-based decisions and address challenges in food systems discourse, policy development and implementation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
   
   
3. 
   Agroecology
   This Initiative aims to develop and scale agroecological innovations with small-scale farmers and other agricultural and food system actors across different socio-ecological contexts in seven low- and middle-income countries.
   
   See; 30 August 2022. Action Research Towards Agroecological Transitions - Set Off Webinar by CGIAR.
   
   
4. 
   Sustainable Healthy Diets
   
   Sustainable Healthy Diets aims to ensure sustainable healthy diets for all by stimulating the demand for sustainable healthy diets and the supply of sustainable nutritious foods, while also improving livelihoods, gender equity, and social inclusiveness in all sectors of food systems.
   
   
5. Rethinking Food Markets
   
   
   This Initiative aims to provide evidence on what types of bundled innovations, incentive structures and policies are most effective for creating more equitable sharing of income and employment opportunities in growing food markets, while reducing the food sector’s environmental footprint.
   
   
6. NEXUS Gains
   
   
   This Initiative aims to realize multiple benefits across water, energy, food and ecosystems in selected transboundary river basins, by leading global nexus thinking and providing tools, guidelines, training and facilitation for analysis and research for development.
   
   
   
   
7. National Policies and Strategies
   
   
   This Initiative aims to deliver food and water security by identifying ways of building stronger policies and strategies with greater coherence and capacity, helping countries address current crises and future development needs.
   
   
8. 
   Gender Equality
   
   This Initiative aims to use impactful gender research to address the four dimensions of gender inequality by applying gender-transformative approaches to harmful norms, bundling socio-technical innovations for women’s empowerment, leveraging social protection to increase women’s access to and control over resources, and promoting inclusive governance and policies for increased resilience.
   
   
9. Digital Innovation
   
   
   This Initiative aims to develop and support digital innovations to stimulate the inclusive, sustainable transformation of food, land and water systems in the areas of investments that policymakers could make to close the digital divide, information delivery systems that allow more people to take action against predicted risks, and ways for partner organizations and marginalized communities to enhance digital capabilities, access resources and opportunities.
   
   
10. Foresight
    
    
    This Initiative aims to leverage innovative use of data, state-of-the-art analytics and deep and ongoing dialogue with national, regional and global partners to offer better insights into alternative transformation pathways that can inform choices and sharpen decision-making today, leading to more productive, sustainable and inclusive food, land and water systems in the future.
    
    
    
    
11. 
    Climate Resilience - ClimBeR
    
    The CGIAR Initiative on Climate Resilience, also known as ClimBeR, aims to transform the climate adaptation capacity of food and agricultural systems in low- and middle-income countries. Its goal is to tackle vulnerability to climate change at its roots and support countries as they adapt and build equitable and sustainable futures.
    
    
12. 
    West and Central African Food Systems Transformation
    
    This Initiative aims to improve nutrition, incomes and food security within the context of climate change in West and Central Africa through nutritious, climate-adapted and market-driven food systems.
    
13. 
    Diversification in East and Southern Africa
    
    This Initiative aims to support climate-resilient agriculture and livelihoods in 12 countries in East and Southern Africa by helping millions of smallholders intensify, diversify and reduce the risks in maize-based farming through improved extension services, small and medium enterprise development, supporting governance frameworks and increased investment with a gender and social inclusion lens.
    
    
    
    
14. Transforming Agrifood Systems in South Asia
    
    
    Working across South Asia, this Initiative aims to deliver a coordinated program of research and engagement across the food production–to–consumption continuum to support equitable access to sustainable healthy diets, improve farmer livelihoods and resilience, and conserve land, air and groundwater resources.
    
    
15. Mixed Farming Systems
    
    
    This Initiative aims to provide equitable, transformative pathways for improved livelihoods of actors in mixed farming systems through sustainable intensification within target agroecologies and socioeconomic settings.
    
    
    
    
16. Asian Mega-Deltas
    
    
    This Initiative aims to create resilient, inclusive and productive deltas, which maintain socio-ecological integrity, adapt to climatic and other stressors, and support human prosperity and wellbeing, by removing systemic barriers to the scaling of transformative technologies and practices at community, national and regional levels. 
    
    
    
    
    
17. Sustainable Animal Productivity
    
    This Initiative aims to contribute to transforming livestock sectors in target countries to make them more productive, resilient, equitable and sustainable.
    
    
    
    
18. 
    Resilient Cities
    
    This Initiative aims to provide research support to strengthen the vibrant, largely informal urban and peri-urban agrifood sector, to help improve sustainability, equity and opportunity growth and to mitigate risks to human and environmental health.
    
    
19. Aquatic Foods
    
    
    This Initiative aims to build the resilience of aquatic food systems and realize their full potential for nature, people and climate by tackling systemic challenges such as data gaps and power asymmetries, improving water resource management, investing in genetic improvement and addressing missed opportunities for scaling, through agricultural innovation systems.
    
    
20. Agri LAC Resiliente
    
    
    This Initiative aims to increase the resilience, sustainability and competitiveness of Latin American and Caribbean agrifood systems and actors by better equipping them to meet urgent food security needs, reduce climate threats, stabilize conflict-vulnerable communities and reduce out-migration.
    
    
21. Plant Health
    
    
    
    This Initiative aims to protect agriculture-based economies of low- and middle-income countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America from devastating crop pest incursions and disease outbreaks by developing, validating and deploying inclusive innovations, and by leveraging and building viable networks across an array of national, regional and global institutions.
    
    
22. Nature-Positive Solutions
    
    
    This Initiative aims to re-imagine, co-create, and implement nature-positive solutions-based agrifood systems that equitably support local food and livelihoods, while simultaneously ensuring that agriculture is a net positive contributor to nature.
    
    
23. Excellence in Agronomy
    
    
    This Initiative aims to deliver an increase in productivity and quality per unit of input (agronomic gain) for millions of smallholder farming households in prioritized farming systems by 2030, with an emphasis on women and young farmers, showing a measurable impact on food and nutrition security, income, resource use, soil health, climate resilience and climate change mitigation. 
    
    
24. Fragility to Resilience in Central and West Asia and North Africa
    
    
    This Initiative aims to respond to the climate, nutrition and agrifood challenges most affecting the CWANA region by applying, scaling and supporting effective, resilience-focused solutions, reducing fragility and conflict, and empowering all stakeholders for change, while minimizing and/or mitigating any trade-offs.
    
    
25. One Health
    
    
    This Initiative aims to demonstrate how One Health principles and tools integrated into food systems can help reduce and contain zoonotic disease outbreaks, improve food and water safety and reduce anti-microbial resistance, benefiting human, animal and environmental health.
    
    
26. Seed Equal
    
    
    This Initiative aims to support the delivery of seed of improved, climate-resilient, market-preferred and nutritious varieties of priority crops, embodying a high rate of genetic gain to farmers, ensuring equitable access for women and other disadvantaged groups.
    
    
27. Market Intelligence
    
    
    This Initiative aims to maximize CGIAR and partners’ returns on investment in breeding, seed systems and other Initiatives based on reliable and timely market intelligence that enables stronger demand orientation and strengthens co-ownership and co-implementation by CGIAR and partners.
    
    
28. Breeding Resources
    
    
    This Initiative aims to improve the genetic, economic, social and environmental performance of breeding programs across the CGIAR-NARES breeding network.
    
    
29. Genebanks
    
    CGIAR genebanks manage collections of more than 20 staple crops in 10 locations across five
    
    continents. The collections are made freely available upon request to thousands of users worldwide every year under the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, accounting for a large amount of the germplasm being exchanged under the multilateral system of access and benefit-sharing. This Initiative aims to support the global system for the conservation and use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.
    
    
30. Livestock and Climate
    
    
    This Initiative aims to address the “double burden” that climate change poses for livestock production across Africa and Latin America. Researchers are working with public and private actors to identify existing solutions and to co-create and deliver innovations that quantifiably help producers, businesses and governments adapt livestock agrifood systems to climate change and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
    
    
31. Accelerated Breeding
    
    
    This Initiative aims to develop better-performing, farmer-preferred crop varieties and to decrease the average age of varieties in farmers’ fields, providing real-time adaptation to climate change, evolving markets and production systems.