POLICY SEMINAR
Research Findings on Resilience & Social Cohesion in Burkina Faso and Niger
Co-organized by IFPRI, World Food Programme (WFP), Institute for Peace and Development (IPD), and the CGIAR Research Initiative on Fragility, Conflict, and Migration (FCM)

Security in the Sahel is deteriorating rapidly. The number of violent events jumped from 580 in 2018 to over 1,000 in the first half of 2022 alone. Associated fatalities are also up dramatically, from about 2,800 fatalities to almost 6,500. Insecurity is also becoming more widespread, especially in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger. As a result, people are fleeing their homes – the region now hosts over 3 million internally displaced people and over 1 million refugees and asylum seekers. There are multiple drivers behind this deterioration, but conflict over land and resources has become a major source of violence across the region, triggered by population growth, land degradation, and climate change.

Deteriorating security has other serious impacts on people’s lives and food security. These include loss of access to agricultural and pastoral production areas, disruption of economic activities or complete loss of livelihoods, limited access to labour and agricultural inputs, and the closure or limited functioning of health services, schools, and markets.

The World Food Programme (WFP) and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) have built a partnership to strengthen WFP food assistance interventions through operational research. As part of WFP’s flagship development program in the Sahel – the Integrated Resilience Programme (IRP) – the two organizations set out to strengthen the evidence needed for interventions. In June 2021, WFP commissioned a study to explore how integrated resilience interventions contribute to social cohesion in Niger and Burkina Faso. This research conducted by IFPRI in collaboration with the Institute for Peace and Development (IPD) sheds light on how WFP interventions contribute to reducing tensions and improving social cohesion in fragile contexts.

Following the report publication (here), WFP, IFPRI and IPD are jointly offering this webinar to disseminate the study’s findings and to create an opportunity for interested actors to discuss their feedback and the way forward.

Introduction & Overview
Katrina Kosec, Senior Research Fellow, IFPRI

Welcome Remarks
Thomas Conan, Senior Humanitarian Adviser, WFP Regional Bureau Dakar

WFP’s Integrated Resilience Approach
Ones Karuho, Senior Advisor & Head of Unit at WFP Regional Bureau Dakar

Social Cohesion, Land Tenure, and Women’s Empowerment
Ruth Meinzen-Dick, Senior Research Fellow, IFPRI

Findings on Resilience & Social Cohesion in Burkina Faso and Niger
Hippolyt Pul, Executive Leader, Institute for Peace and Development (IPD)

WFP’s Evidence Generation Strategy & Next Steps on Social Cohesion Measurement within Resilience
Cheikh Samb, Research, Assessment & Monitoring Officer, WFP Regional Bureau Dakar
Nancy McCarthy, President, Lead Analytics

Moderator
Katrina Kosec, Senior Research Fellow, IFPRI

More about this seminar: hhttps://www.ifpri.org/event/webinar-research-findings-resilience-social-cohesion-burkina-faso-and-niger
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RELATED PUBLICATIONS
Sahel Social Cohesion Research In Burkina Faso And Niger: Working Paper: https://www.ifpri.org/publication/sahel-social-cohesion-research-burkina-faso-and-niger-working-paper

LINKS
World Food Programme (WFP): https://www.wfp.org/
Institute For Peace And Development (IPD): https://www.ipdafrica.org/
CGIAR Research Initiative On Fragility, Conflict, And Migration (FCM): https://www.cgiar.org/initiative/fragility-conflict-and-migration/

Research Findings on Resilience & Social Cohesion in Burkina Faso and Niger

Introductory Remarks by Geraldo B. Martha Jr., Coordinator, Embrapa, Labex-USA
 
Successful agricultural transformations around the world provide critical lessons and offer insights into opportunities for other countries seeking to take this step forward.

 
At this special event, we will learn about Brazil’s agricultural transformation from Embrapa’s President, Maurício Lopes. IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan will share insights from Asian countries, ERS Administrator Mary Bohman will review the experience of the United States, and Asia-Brazil Agro Alliance President Marcos Jank will discuss the role of the food industry in agricultural transformation.

IFPRI Special Event:  Transforming Agriculture - 5/15/2018 - GMartha

Speaker: Marcos Sawaya Jank, President, Asia-Brazil Agro Alliance and IFPRI Board member
 
Successful agricultural transformations around the world provide critical lessons and offer insights into opportunities for other countries seeking to take this step forward.
 
At this special event, we will learn about Brazil’s agricultural transformation from Embrapa’s President, Maurício Lopes. IFPRI Director General Shenggen Fan will share insights from Asian countries, ERS Administrator Mary Bohman will review the experience of the United States, and Asia-Brazil Agro Alliance President Marcos Jank will discuss the role of the food industry in agricultural transformation.

IFPRI Special Event:  Transforming Agriculture - 5/15/2018  - M.Jank

What happens when a child is malnourished? Can such a child ever “catch up” later in life? Why does urbanization and obesity seem to go hand in hand—and what does this mean for food production? We’ll explore big picture food system questions today on the Leading Voices in Food with our guest Dr. Shenggen Fan.

The Leading Voices in Food

Shenggen Fan on Hunger, Climate Change and the Hope of Innovation

Speaker: William A. Masters, Professor, Tufts University

Interventions and innovation can lower the price of individual foods, but healthy eating depends on access to a mix of foods from diverse sources. How has the overall cost of meeting dietary needs changed over time worldwide, and in Africa and South Asia specifically? What determines the cost of a healthy diet? And how does affordability affect dietary intake and health status in different locales?

To answer these questions, Changing Access to Nutritious Diets in Africa and South Asia (CANDASA) (https://sites.tufts.edu/candasa) has been using new food price indexes that account for food substitutions to meet nutritional needs to evaluate food systems all over the world, including in Ethiopia, Ghana, India, Malawi, and Tanzania.

This seminar will present the outcomes of CANDASA’s work to date, with a panel discussion featuring field researchers from each country to discuss the local and global implications of their results.

Research by Tufts and IFPRI on this topic is supported by UKAid and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

IFPRI Policy Seminar:  What is the Cost of a Healthy Diet? - 5/29/2019 - WMasters

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) provides research-based policy solutions to sustainably reduce poverty and end hunger and malnutrition in developing countries. Established in 1975, IFPRI currently has more than 600 employees working in over 50 countries. It is a research center of CGIAR, a worldwide partnership engaged in agricultural research for development.

Research Findings on Resilience & Social Cohesion in Burkina Faso and Niger

International Food Policy Research Institute

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