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The importance of a resilient agriculture sector in providing food security, livelihoods, and household income was highlighted in many countries by the recent pandemic, as was the capacity of the sector to cushion the negative impacts of the subsequent economic slowdown. This has been the case in Egypt, where agriculture has been resilient to the health crisis in comparison with the service and industry sectors (Breisinger et al. 2020). However, the sector’s resiliency is gradually being corroded by climate change, with lasting, harmful effects for agriculture and food systems.

This paper assesses the potential role of investments in irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa in improving food security and self-sufficiency in the region. Focusing on the region’s drylands, the study identifies a potential for expanded irrigated area of 6–14 million hectares (ha), depending on technology costs and other factors. Linkage of these results with a global agricultural trade model shows that accelerated irrigation investment can effectively reduce growing food import dependency from 54% under a business-as-usual scenario to a much smaller 17–40%; and can also reduce the population at risk of hunger and child under-nutrition.

The Philippines is much more prone to climate change effects than are many other countries. The potential impact on the agriculture sector is of particular concern, given its vital role in the economy and for vulnerable households. Most research warns of the negative impact of climate change on yields for major cereal crops, which could threaten food security and hinder the long-run development process. Incremental adaptation through the introduction of new crop varieties, improved agricultural management practices, and more efficient irrigation are expected to reduce yield losses. However, efforts to promote systemwide adjustment would have broader effects, especially as the risk of climate change increases. This study proposes a new approach for adaptation strategies by exploring policy reform in agriculture as a transformative way to help economic agents adapt to climate change. We specifically explore the rice policy reform currently being pursued by the government through the abolishment of the rice quota program. We find this reform could help transform the agricultural and economic system by allowing scarce resources move from low- to high-productivity sectors, thus increasing the country’s adaptive capacity. However, the rice farmer and vulnerable groups that are prone to climate shocks are adversely affected by the policy. Thus, we introduce alternative intervention policies to complement the reform agenda by providing a cash transfers program to vulnerable groups or a subsidy to support rice farmers. Both offer less impact in economic efficiency gains, but the cash transfer program is superior in terms of supporting the vulnerable group in coping with climate change under the rice reform policy. This shows that the transformational adaptation strategy may create a welfare loss to certain agents but that adding government intervention could act as the second-best policy and become a transition pathway before the whole system transforms to reach the optimal efficiency point when the intervention program is eventually phased out.

A group of biophysical and economic models is configured to implement a modelling approach to upscale Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) technologies to simulate the impacts and costs of climate change at the national level. There is also an attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of CSA technologies in counteracting the impacts of climate change. Due to climate change, crop yields and production are projected to decline by as much as 10.5 and 9.9% respectively, compared to the rest of the world, where the predicted yield and production declines will be 5.0 and 3.7% in 2050. CSA technologies can fully compensate for the yield and production effects of climate change. Among the single CSA technology suites, irrigation water technology and soil-fertility technology seem to be the best, but adoption of stacked technologies appears to provide higher benefits. CSA technologies alone are insufficient to achieve the goal of doubling farmers’ income. Additional policies and investment are needed to ensure price stability and encourage crop intensification and diversification to boost farm incomes.

The resolution adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 25 September 2015 is symptomatic of the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus. It postulates goals and related targets for 2030 that include (1) End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture (SDG2); (2) Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all (SDG6); and (3) Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all (SDG7). There will be tradeoffs between achieving these goals particularly in the wake of changing consumption patterns and rising demands from a growing population expected to reach more than nine billion by 2050. This paper uses global economic analysis tools to assess the impacts of long-term changes in fossil fuel prices, for example, as a result of a carbon tax under the UNFCCC or in response to new, large findings of fossil energy sources, on water and food outcomes. We find that a fossil fuel tax would not adversely affect food security and could be a boon to global food security if it reduces adverse climate change impacts.

This paper presents an integrated grain and livestock sector partial equilibrium supply-demand model and utilizes it to project the Indonesian production, consumption and trade situation for major crop and livestock commodities under alternative trade, pricing, and investment policies. The possible long term implications of the 1997–1998. Indonesian economic crisis are also explored. The alternative simulations confirm the importance of investment in agricultural research, extension, and irrigation for future growth in the crop and livestock sectors. Interventions in input and output prices, on the other hand, can be costly. The projections also provide strong evidence that fertilizer subsidies should be eliminated. Removal of these subsidies will have very little impact on future food production, and transfer of the fiscal savings from elimination of the subsidy into productive investments would have large benefits. The results indicate that the economic crisis could severely slow the process of diversification of Indonesian diets and growth in food consumption if income effects are prolonged into the next century.

This paper analyzes dynamic food crop supply response in Indonesia. The effects of technology, prices, and investments on output growth for rice, corn, soybean, and cassava are examined. The analysis generates crop-wise area, yield, and input demand parameters suitable for the evaluation of price and investment policies, and shows the large impact of public investment in agricultural research, extension, and irrigation on long-run output growth in Indonesia. Elimination of the fertilizer subsidy and reinvestment of the resulting fiscal savings in research, extension and irrigation would produce large benefits.