As agrifood systems face mounting socio-ecological challenges, agroecology is increasingly viewed as a comprehensive approach to achieving sustainability. However, the public debate over whether this is the most suitable approach or whether it is viable at a large scale remains open. Examining how this debate unfolds is crucial as it can shape the future of agrifood systems. This paper contributes by conducting a systematic literature review to identify key perspectives and actors shaping the public debate around agroecology. Perspectives are framed around three narratives labeled "supportive," "skeptical," and "pragmatic." These narratives are articulated across sub-narratives in six highly debated areas: (1) initial transition costs, (2) input use and supply chain systems, (3) yield potential, (4) labor, (5) scalability, and (6) market access. The review also accounts for a broad group of actors participating in the debate from multiple - sometimes ambiguous and fluid - perspectives. The review shows that mobilizing the debate to enable agroecological transitions requires an integrative approach underscored by knowledge co-creation and collective learning. Based on insights from participatory approaches, we provide considerations for making these processes work and highlight areas that require further examination.

Advancing agroecological transitions requires developing supportive policy frameworks. However, to date, the way such frameworks emerge has not been documented in depth and in detail. This paper addresses this gap by examining the formation of agroecology policy landscapes (policy and actor constellations). The cases of Peru and Kenya are examined through a framework of drivers of policy change. We found evidence that the interplay of multiple crises, civil advocacy, and emerging agroecological cognitive frames resulted in a transition towards a more favorable policy landscape for agroecology in the two countries. This transition, however, is limited due to institutional ambiguity and political reluctance to alter the status quo. This study demonstrates the need for policies and institutions supporting farmers' self-organization, agency, advocacy capacity, and territorial decision-making, as well as reexamining policies that promote industrial agriculture and corporate interests. Establishing coherent agroecological framings within policymaking is essential for enabling agroecology-supportive policy landscapes.

Recent research and development efforts to achieve sustainable rice production in Vietnam have incorporated agroecological principles and practices. These efforts have come as a result of increasing pressure on food systems to achieve global food security. Growing food demand, rising population, climate change, and natural resources degradation, make it necessary to transform the current production systems towards more sustainable models. Agroecology is being promoted as one of the pathways to transition toward sustainable food production, with broad adoption requiring incentives for farmers. Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews guidelines, we conducted a scoping review of 120 articles to understand the incentives applied for promoting agroecological practices, whether and how the incentives promote the adoption of agroecological practices, and their relationship with economic, environmental, and social outcomes among rice farmers in Vietnam. Such in-depth reviews of the role of incentives in the agroecological transition are scarce. Results show that in about 60% of the articles, incentives led to adoption, outcomes (e.g., yield and income gains), or both, suggesting the importance and common use of incentives among rice farmers in Vietnam. Four types of incentives used were market, non-market, regulatory, and cross-compliance. These incentives directly or indirectly influenced outcomes through the adoption of agroecological practices. Market incentives (33%) were relatively more important for directly influencing outcomes, while non-market incentives (50%) were more important for indirectly influencing outcomes. Market, non-market, and regulatory incentives were more associated with the adoption of new agronomic practices, such as farm diversification, improved varieties, and organic agriculture than with other practices, while cross-compliance incentives were more highly associated with adoption of agroforestry. Generally, the incentives used were more associated with economic outcomes (56%), than with environmental (31%), and social (13%) outcomes. Overall, the results show that incentives influence outcomes differently, and a combination of different incentives is required to achieve holistic outcomes.

Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cubense Tropical Race 4 (TR4) is spreading throughout South America and the world, threatening the banana industry as it decimates the Cavendish plantations and many other local varieties. This study addresses a major gap in the literature by employing a socioeconomic and cost-benefit analysis to explore the vulnerability of banana producers to TR4 and the financial viability of disease management strategies and potential losses in the event of TR4 spreading within the study area. Semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions were conducted with producers and key stakeholders in Piura, Peru, which is Peru's most important region for producing organic bananas for export. The results show that 45% of farms have TR4 and 10% of banana farms have been completely devastated by TR4. Production, banana sales, income, and food security are lower among producers with TR4 in their plantations. Prevention and mitigation strategies, such as disinfecting shoes, tools, and machinery at farm entrances, are critical and financially viable methods to prevent the spread of TR4. On average, producers without TR4 have a net present value (NPV) of $48,014 per hectare, which is significantly higher than the NPV of $8,535 per hectare for producers affected by TR4, highlighting TR4 ' s severe economic impact and the need to implement mitigation strategies. Recommendations to the public and private sector to build a banana sector more resilient to TR4 include supporting the implementation of surveillance and mitigation strategies, as well as raising awareness about TR4 and the importance of certified banana seeds.

IntroductionAgroecology is increasingly promoted as a pathway to sustainable food production, aiming to maximize natural resource use while minimizing external inputs with harmful environmental effects. Agroecological practices can enhance farm productivity while ensuring environmental sustainability. However, these practices often require higher initial investments compared to business-as-usual (BAU) practices, and their profitability and relative risks are not well studied. This research evaluates the profitability and risk of adopting agroecological practices among wheat farmers in Ethiopia.MethodsWe conducted a deterministic cost-benefit analysis (CBA) incorporating sensitivity and scenario analysis to evaluate the profitability and relative risks associated with three agroecological practices: certified wheat seed, optimal site-specific inorganic fertilizer application rates, and drainage of waterlogged soils. The analysis considered yield uncertainty, market price fluctuations, and implementation variability to provide robust insights for decision-making.ResultsThe deterministic CBA revealed that among the three practices, the use of certified seeds was the most profitable, with a net present value (NPV) of US$ 2,531 ha–1. This was followed by optimal site-specific inorganic fertilizer application, with an NPV of US$ 2,371 ha–1. Drainage of waterlogged soils yielded the lowest profitability, with an NPV of US$ 2,099 ha–1.DiscussionThe results indicate that certified seeds and optimal fertilizer rates offer higher financial returns, making them attractive investments for wheat farmers. However, profitability alone does not guarantee adoption. Other factors, including social and behavioral aspects, influence farmer decisions. Future research should integrate these dimensions to develop comprehensive strategies for promoting agroecological practices.ConclusionAdopting agroecological practices has clear economic benefits for Ethiopian wheat farmers, with certified seeds emerging as the most profitable option. These findings provide evidence for stakeholders to design targeted interventions that maximize returns while addressing barriers to adoption.

Agrifood system scholars increasingly use path dependence and lock-in concepts in an attempt to explain why some agrifood systems cannot transition to sustainable alternatives. However, most research lacks an appropriate framework examining the underlying mechanisms. This integrative literature review addresses how path dependence and lock-in have been studied in agrifood systems, when these systems experience lock-in, and how power dynamics reinforce path dependence processes. We integrate path dependence, lock-in, and power dynamics into an explanatory framework that enhances understanding of lock-in that operates farm-level practices, research systems, and agrifood systems. The framework identifies technological interrelationships, economies of scale, quasi-irreversibility of investments, and learning effects as critical lock-in mechanisms. Our study shows how different forms of power - power over, power with, and power to - function as moderating mechanisms that either reinforce existing lock-ins or create transformation pathways. Understanding lock-in and how mechanisms operate together enables movement toward sustainable forms of agriculture such as agroecology. Promoting agroecological practices at farm level requires simultaneous changes in research priorities, supply chain configurations, policy frameworks, and market structures. The framework highlights the importance of understanding power dynamics when designing transition strategies, particularly how collaborative power arrangements can maintain status quo or catalyze change depending on participating actors and values guiding their collective action.

Background This study is a process evaluation of a nutrition education intervention that is part of a large-scale development program targeting vulnerable tribal groups in Odisha, India.Objective The objectives are to examine whether the intervention is operating as planned (implementation fidelity), investigate potential pathways to achieve greater impact, and provide recommendations on how to design nutrition education interventions in similar contexts.Methods A program impact pathway forms the basis of this process evaluation, tracing inputs, processes, outputs, outcomes, and impacts. The study's mixed-methods approach includes semistructured interviews, focus group discussions, and Process Net-Mapping. Narrative analysis was applied to examine the transcripts. Data were analyzed in the context of the program impact pathway.Results The intervention was not delivered as intended (low implementation fidelity). Flexibility was key in providing nutrition education to beneficiaries despite challenges, such as the inability to utilize behavior change communication, inadequate funding, and language and cultural barriers. Despite low fidelity, the qualitative results show that the intervention improved awareness of nutrition and health among beneficiaries.Conclusions Providing adequate resources for training frontline workers and beneficiaries is required for nutrition education programs to achieve their desired effectiveness and impact. Utilizing existing organizations, integration into production-based interventions, and incorporating easy-to-understand nutrition models, practical demonstrations, and videos would increase frontline worker and beneficiary engagement and understanding, leading to improved maternal and child nutritional and health outcomes.

Given the extended hours demanded by the labour market and the health risks posed by pollution from nonrenewable energy sources, the question of whether households are willing to prioritise clean energy over leisure remains unresolved. This study addresses this gap by investigating the impact of time constraints, encompassing both paid and unpaid work, on the Multidimensional Energy Poverty Index (MEPI) using data from the seventh round of the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS 7). Our findings indicate that households experiencing time constraints are more inclined to adopt clean energy fuels. A decomposition analysis of time constraints reveals that while those stemming from paid work encourage the adoption of clean energy fuels, those associated with unpaid work hinder it. This suggests that households prioritise clean energy when faced with time pressures related to paid employment. Our results hold across various estimation methods and withstand robustness checks using different time and energy poverty metrics. The adverse impact of time constraints on energy poverty is particularly pronounced in rural areas, male-headed households and communities with accessible roads. We posit that household income serves as a key mechanism through which time constraints influence energy poverty.

Africa is not on track to achieve SDG 2, eradicating hunger by 2030. We argue that for meaningful and sustained food security, African people and institutions must be empowered to determine how their food systems are shaped. Drawing from a conceptual framework tailored to the African food system, we emphasise that regulative, normative, and cognitive institutions play a central role in structuring food systems on the continent. Agency is the means through which these institutions are activated and transformed. The profit-driven orientation and corporate concentration in the current food system impairs institutional capacity and local agency. To advance food security, food system transformation in Africa must be shaped by institutional pluralism, contextual specificity, and locally defined priorities.

Abstract Background Most reviews of nutrition-sensitive programs assess the evidence base for nutrition outcomes without considering how programs were delivered. Process evaluations can fill this void by exploring how or why impacts were or were not achieved. This mid-term process evaluation examines a home garden intervention implemented in a large-scale, livelihoods improvement program in Odisha, India. The objectives are to understand whether the intervention was operating as planned (fidelity), investigate potential pathways to achieve greater impact, and provide insights to help design future home garden programs. Methodology Data collection and analysis for this theory-driven process evaluation are based on a program impact pathway that shows the flow of inputs, processes, outputs, outcomes, and impacts. Quantitative and qualitative data from focus group discussions, semi-structured interviews, and a Process Net-Mapping exercise with beneficiaries, frontline workers, and program management staff. Results Despite a mismatch between the design and implementation (low fidelity), the process evaluation identified positive outputs, outcomes, and impacts on home garden production, consumption, income, health and nutritional outcomes, and women’s empowerment. Flexibility led to greater positive outcomes on nutrition, the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices and easy-to-understand nutrition models, and the likelihood of the intervention being sustained after the program ends. Conclusions To help food systems in rural settings reduce food insecurity by utilizing more sustainable agricultural practices, we recommend that home garden interventions include instruction on easy-to-understand nutrition models and on how to make natural fertilizer. Finding local solutions like home gardens to help address critical supply issues and food insecurity is paramount.

There is a clear and urgent call to transform our food systems as a critical nexus to tackle ongoing global climate, biodiversity, equity, and nutrition crises. Many food and agricultural innovations are being developed and scaled but these innovations often target sector-specific problems and remain disconnected from the more complex demand for transformative change at scale. To bridge this demand for systemic change within the innovation ecosystem, initiatives are applying various approaches such as visioning, holistic assessments, innovation portfolio management and multistakeholder co-creation. Here we report on insights from applying a food systems tailored backcasting approach in a diversity of settings since 2021, including a national food system dialogue, a youth business innovation challenge, a landscape multi-stakeholder platform, a public-private sector co-learning session, an agroecological transitions program, and a hybrid food systems university course for graduate students and global professionals. We thereby build on existing literature and case studies of how change happens (or does not happen) and aim to use those insights to support food systems change makers. Across these settings, the backcasting approach asks participants to connect innovations with broader systems-change visions, to anticipate tradeoffs for multiple food system outcomes and population groups, and to cross sectoral boundaries. The use cases demonstrate that the backcasting process contributes to changes in views, practices and structures that participants work with. Specifically, it supports moving beyond “silver bullet” innovation approaches, the bundling of social and technical innovations, and building action-oriented cross-sectoral bridges. Food systems change is complex and innovations alone are insufficient to address its complexity. But innovations can play a positive role if connected to more holistic systems-change processes and goals. Considering strengths and limitations of the backcasting approach, the diversity of practical applications supports its potential to connect innovations to holistic food systems visions, to strengthen cross-sectoral collaboration and to bundle social and technical innovations for desirable food systems change.

Women’s empowerment has been promoted by researchers and development practitioners as one of the most promising strategies to address widespread hunger and malnutrition. However, the relationship between women’s empowerment and dietary diversity and child nutrition has rarely been studied among vulnerable populations or individuals at greater risk of poor physical and social health status. Moreover, the effects of different domains of women’s empowerment on nutritional outcomes, including dietary diversity and child anthropometry, have rarely been examined, especially with panel data. Using two rounds of panel data from 1900 households and fixed effects regression models, we analyze the effect of women’s empowerment on household dietary diversity score (HDDS) and child anthropometry among the particularly vulnerable tribal groups in Odisha, India. We also estimate the effects of various decision-making domains of women’s empowerment on HDDS and child anthropometry to understand which empowerment domains matter for nutrition. Results show that women’s empowerment is positively associated with HDDS (coef. 0.41 food groups; p < 0.1) and reduces the prevalence of underweight (coef. 39%; p < 0.05) and wasting (coef. 56%; p < 0.1) in children but has no effect on the prevalence of child stunting. Women’s empowerment in agricultural input use; output sales; income; food purchases; and credit, group membership, and employment contribute to improved dietary diversity and child nutrition. We conclude that women’s empowerment contributes to improved dietary diversity and child nutrition and is a promising strategy to improve farm household diets and child nutrition among vulnerable populations. Strengthening women’s empowerment through the promotion of women’s access to land and other agricultural inputs, market participation, access to information, capital, and credit is important.

The global banana industry faces a significant threat from Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cubense Tropical Race 4 (TR4). While prior research has concentrated on TR4's dissemination, reproductive conditions, and resistant banana varieties, this study employs a socioeconomic and cost-benefit analysis to explore the vulnerability of banana producers to TR4 in Colombia. It assesses the financial viability of current monitoring strategies and estimates potential losses in the event of TR4 spreading within the study area. Interviews were conducted with producers and key stakeholders in Colombia's top two banana-producing departments, Antioquia and Magdalena. The findings reveal that farming systems are highly vulnerable to TR4, particularly due to the prevalent use of corms. Producers employ preventive measures such as cement paths, fences, disinfecting stations, and footbaths to counteract TR4's spread. A cost-benefit analysis indicates that the benefits of these prevention methods significantly outweigh the associated costs, with a net present value of implementing prevention strategies per hectare of $95,389 USD and $112,527 USD in Magdalena and Antioquia and a benefit-cost ratio of 3.1 and 4.2, respectively. Considering the substantial impact TR4 could have in Colombia if it becomes more widespread, we recommend widespread adoption of preventive measures, including the construction and utilization of cement paths and disinfectant methods on all banana farms. Additionally, to enhance awareness and early detection, we propose leveraging technology, such as mobile applications (apps) and chat groups, to empower farmers in identifying and preventing the spread of TR4.

To alleviate impacts of novel coronavirus lockdowns on food security and agri-food value chains, governments implemented various policy responses, yet there is limited evidence as to their effectiveness to build resilience in food systems and improve food security. One of these programs was implemented by self-help groups (SHGs) in Odisha, India, linking fresh fruit and vegetable (FFV) producers to consumers. This study integrates the concept of resilience into the six-dimensional food security framework (food availability, access, utilization, and stability, agency, and sustainability) and applies the framework to examine whether a FFV procurement program affected all six dimensions of food security and helped build resilience in food systems. Based on qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions, the results show that by enabling SHGs to fulfill the role of value chain actors prohibited from operating during the lockdown, the program had positive effects on availability, accessibility, utilization, and stability, with mixed effects on agency and sustainability. Applying the six-dimensional food security framework allowed us to show that despite some tradeoffs both across and within the dimensions for various actors, overall the program was able to build more resilient food systems. Activating preexisting organizations to reestablish fractured value chains can provide a model to replicate in times of crisis, such as pandemics and extreme climate events, when both rural and urban value chain actors can operate only at limited capacity and the public sector is overwhelmed. To accelerate the transformation of food systems towards healthier diets and greater resilience to shocks and crises, we recommend strengthening existing and establishing new organizations to help respond to crises and future shocks. A multifaceted approach will help ensure that the most vulnerable will not be left behind.

Home gardens have been an integral part of the recent food-based interventions aimed at stimulating changes in dietary patterns and improving nutrition. However, evidence of their effects on food security, dietary quality, child anthropometry and incomes is limited, particularly among vulnerable populations groups. Using panel data from a sample of approximately 1900 households from vulnerable population groups in Odisha, India, difference-in-differences and other econometric techniques, we analyse the effects of home gardens on food security, dietary quality, child anthropometry and income. On average, home gardens contribute to better household food security, higher dietary quality of men and women but do not contribute to higher children's dietary quality and anthropometry. Also, home gardens increase monthly per adult equivalent incomes by 37% and reduce the prevalence of poverty by 11.7 percentage points. Quantile regression results suggest that home gardens enhance food security and incomes in all quantiles, but richer farmers benefit more than poorer farmers. Overall, home gardens can enhance household food security, dietary quality of men and women, and income gains among vulnerable farming population groups, but they may not suffice to improve child dietary quality and anthropometry.

Abstract Why is finding solutions to combat the increasing access to affordable ultra-processed foods so controversial and what strategies are necessary for policy change? To address this question, this chapter applies a political economy analysis of coalitions and policy beliefs in the ultra-processed food environment in Ghana. By combining the Advocacy Coalition Framework with the discourse analysis approach and factor analysis, the chapter reveals a trichotomy of coalitions in the food environment, consisting of state, market, and civil society actors. The discourses reveal shared policy beliefs among these coalitions on the need for more regulation, independent beliefs on production incentives, and divergent beliefs on public awareness. The evidence highlights entry points for policy-oriented learning and policy change, including subsidies to support access to healthy foods, a prohibitive tax on ultra-processed foods, voluntary regulations, labeling and advertisement bans, and regulatory instruments.

Accelerating the education of children and reducing child labor in agriculture remains an important development pathway to preventing intergenerational poverty and achieving the sustainable development goals. While several studies have analyzed the impact of ecological stressors on yield, income, and food security, there is limited understanding of the linkages of prevailing ecological shocks to child education and farm work. In this paper, we examine the effect of ecological shocks of pest and weed invasion on children's school attendance and working hours on the farm using the seventh round of the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS). We employ a multinomial endogenous switching regression (MESR) model that corrects for selection bias and endogeneity originating from both observed and unobserved heterogeneity. The results show that double shocks (pests and weeds) reduced the number of children attending school by 11% and increased children's on-farm working hours by 0.75 h. Comparatively, the decline in the number of children attending school due to weed invasion (0.88) is higher than the decline due to pest invasion (0.43). Furthermore, weed invasion increases children's on-farm working hours by 0.05 h while pest invasion reduces children's on-farm working hours by 0.08 h. Increasing access to improved agricultural technologies bundled with credit and policies are critical to reducing the threats from ecological shocks and improving farmers' welfare. To avert the decline in school attendance and children's working hours requires training farmers to reduce the practice of continuous cropping and to embrace crop rotation and fallow to reduce the spread of pests and weeds.

The importance of the food environment in influencing dietary choices of consumers has been widely acknowledged, but little attention has been paid to the urban food environment in Africa despite the rise in incidence of obesity and other nutrition-related noncommunicable diseases (NR-NCDs). We contribute to the literature on urban food environments by conducting an observational macro-scan of the food environment in three cities - Accra, Cape Coast, and Koforidua - with a view to unravelling the nature of the urban food environment in Ghana. We examine the food environment based on two dimensions of food security - availability and accessibility (affordability) - and also assess the extent to which foods are processed. The results show that all four food categories - unprocessed, processed, processed culinary, and ultra-processed - are available, accessible, and affordable. Ultra-processed foods are just as highly available, accessible, and/or affordable as unprocessed foods. The results also show that processed foods account for the larger share of all foods in Ghana's urban food environment, and ultra-processed foods account for more than 30% of all processed foods. Overall, these results suggest that physical and economic access to food are not major constraints in urban Ghana. This is certainly a welcome finding from a food policy perspective; however, the high availability and accessibility of ultra-processed foods has serious potential health implications. Regulation will be needed to prevent over-consumption of ultra-processed foods and the resulting increase in obesity and other NR-NCDs.