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PR, IFPRI3; ISI; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Cross-cutting gender theme, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, CGIAR Gender Platform, Climate change affects every aspect of the food system, including all nodes along agri-food value chains from production to consumption, the food environments in which people live, and outcomes, such as diets and livelihoods. Men and women often have specific roles and responsibilities within food systems, yet structural inequalities (formal and informal) limit women's access to resources, services, and agency. These inequalities affect the ways in which men and women experience and are affected by climate change. In addition to gender, other social factors are at play, such as age, education, marital status, and health and economic conditions. To date, most climate change policies, investments, and interventions do not adequately integrate gender. If climate-smart and climate-resilient interventions do not adequately take gender differences into account, they might exacerbate gender inequalities in food systems by, for instance, increasing women's labor burden and time poverty, reducing their access to and control over income and assets, and reducing their decision-making power. At the same time, women's contributions are critical to make food systems more resilient to the negative impacts of climate change, given their specialized knowledge, skills and roles in agri-food systems, within the household, at work and in their communities. Increasing the resilience of food systems requires going beyond addressing gendered vulnerabilities to climate change to create an enabling environment that supports gender equality and women's empowerment, by removing structural barriers and rigid gender norms, and building equal power dynamics, as part of a process of gender transformative change. For this to happen, more research is needed to prioritize structural barriers that need to be removed and to identify effective gender transformative approaches.

PR, IFPRI3; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 2 Promoting Healthy Diets and Nutrition for all; GCAN, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, There is growing recognition that water insecurity – the inability to reliably access sufficient water for all household uses – is commonly experienced globally and has myriad adverse consequences for human well-being. The role of water insecurity in food insecurity and diet quality, however, has received minimal attention. Data are from panel surveys conducted during 2020–21 among adults involved in smallholder agriculture in Niger (n = 364, 3 rounds), Nigeria (n = 501, 5 rounds), Senegal (n = 501, 5 rounds), and Ghana (n = 543, 5 rounds). We hypothesized that household water insecurity (measured using the brief Household Water Insecurity Experiences Scale) would be associated with greater individual food insecurity (using 5 of the 8 Food Insecurity Experiences Scale items) and lower dietary diversity (using the Minimum Dietary Diversity Score for Women). At baseline, 37.1% of individuals were living in water-insecure households and of these, 90.6% had some experience of food insecurity. In multilevel mixed-effects regressions, individuals living in water-insecure households had 1.67 (95% CI: 1.47, 1.89) times higher odds of reporting any food insecurity experience and were estimated to consume 0.38-fewer food groups (95% CI: -0.50, -0.27) than those living in water-secure households. Experiences with suboptimal water access and use are associated with poor nutrition. The pathways by which water insecurity impacts nutrition should be identified. Global and national food and nutrition security policies could be strengthened by monitoring and developing strategies to address household water insecurity.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Reaching Smallholder Women, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) is critical for reducing smallholder farmers’ vulnerability and enhancing their capacity to cope with the adverse impacts of climate change. Constraints to information and extension access — especially among women farmers, who play a vital role in Indian agriculture — are increasingly acknowledged as a barrier for widespread adoption of CSA practices. This note summarizes results from a study implemented among smallholder women farmers in rural Gujarat, India, to assess the effectiveness of a participatory video and poster extension intervention on increasing awareness, knowledge, and adoption of CSA practices. The findings sug gest that videos and posters are a viable information delivery mechanism for promoting awareness around CSA practices but should be supplemented with additional capacity development, access to financial resources, and labor-sharing arrangements.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Reaching Smallholder Women, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) has been promoted as a framework to identify a set of solutions that simultaneously sustain agricultural productivity and incomes, increase the resilience of agriculture, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, it has proven to be challenging to reach women farmers with information on CSA practices. This note summarizes results from a study that assessed whether participatory video-based extension approaches tailored to women’s preferred CSA approaches could reduce the gender gap in awareness and adoption of CSA practices in Kenya. The findings suggest that watching the videos increased awareness of the CSA practices promoted in the videos as well as other practices. However, watching the videos did not increase the adoption of the CSA practices. We propose strategies to strengthen the uptake of CSA practices alongside participatory video-based extension.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Solar pumps instead of fossil fuels improve access to irrigation in remote rural areas. But they are also a temptation to consume more groundwater.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; ILSSI; Feed the Future Innovation Laboratory for Small-Scale Irrigation; DCA; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, As a result of growing food demands, more affordable drilling and pumping technologies, and climate change, groundwater resources are rapidly depleting in many places around the world.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; Cross-cutting gender theme; GCAN, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, We cannot overcome the multiple crises facing our world, including the climate crisis, the lingering impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the ongoing food and energy price crisis linked to the war on Ukraine, without integrating a gender perspective into resilience interventions, particularly in the agri-food sector where women have particular roles. However, to date, most climate change policies, investments, and interventions remain gender-blind. As a result, they might exacerbate gender inequalities in food systems by, for instance, increasing women’s labor burden and time poverty, reducing their access to and control over income and assets, and reducing their decision-making power.

PR, IFPRI4; Capacity Strengthening; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, This chapter focuses on the multiple facets and meanings of water and how it is a contested resource. It also explores linkages between SDG 6 (Clean water and sanitation) and SDG 2 (Zero hunger). Water is essential for all life and integral to the functioning of food systems; similarly, changes in our food systems are essential to achieve SDG 6. And improvements in both are needed to reduce inequities in resources and achievements. As an example, land, food and water rights often go hand in hand, and are marked by gender, caste, racial and other exclusions. The chapter highlights how accessing water for food security can be challenging for smallholders and for vulnerable and marginalized women and men, and how water allocation systems, privatization and reform processes can affect local people’s rights to water, land and food. It argues for the need to improve policy coherence across water, land and food, and concludes by making a case for strengthening the relationship between the human right to water and food, especially for marginalized women and men.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Irrigation and Mechanization Systems (ILIMS); 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Irrigation and Mechanization Systems (ILIMS), led by the University of Nebraska’s Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute (DWFI) (Nebraska-ILIMS), was fittingly launched at this year’s World Food Day with the theme “Water is Life, Water is Food. Leave No One Behind.” The research program’s five areas of inquiry will develop socio-technical bundles that support uptake of mechanization and irrigation, strengthen institutions for natural resource governance and climate resilience, enable scaling of suitable technologies and support development of human resources. The fifth area of inquiry makes a leap from technology to nutrition and health, with the specific aim to “formulate strategies for nutrition-sensitive mechanization and irrigation that safeguard and enhance health and inclusivity.”

PR, IFPRI3; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Irrigation, and especially farmer-led irrigation, is considered to be a promising option for enhancing agricultural productivity in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, there is a lack of thorough understanding of the impacts of irrigation development on environment. Past discussions are mainly limited to the water depletion and hydrological regime change effect of irrigation. This paper presents a study to narrow the knowledge gap by assessing nutrient water pollution risk induced by the expansion of farmer-led irrigation in Ethiopia. Using household survey data collected from four woredas in Ethiopia where irrigated crop production currently concentrates, we first evaluate the impact of irrigation on cropping intensity and annual consumption level of fertilizers and then use the findings of the household survey data analysis to support conceptualization of a modeling framework for assessing agricultural nutrient water pollution risk from farmer-led irrigation development in Ethiopia at national scale. We project that overall farmer-led irrigation development in Ethiopia will lead to a gentle increase in national total of agricultural nutrient loadings. This result helps justify the endeavor of promoting farmer-led irrigation in Ethiopia. On the other hand, the projected nutrient flow and nutrient loading growth rate related to the farmer-led irrigation expansion are highly heterogeneous spatially, and risk of local water quality deterioration exists. There is still need to make investment to ensure the environmental sustainability of farmer-led irrigation development.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Development Strategies and Governance (DSG); Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Increasing demand for water juxtaposed with shrinking supplies will require a transfer of water resources out of agriculture into the domestic, industrial, and ideally environmental sectors. To examine the potential of policies to facilitate a release of water from agriculture, this paper uses IFPRI’s Computable General Equilibrium Model with a water extension, CGE-W, to assess the impact of commodity taxes on two highly water consumptive crops, rice and sugarcane, on water consumption and the overall economy. We find that land use grows by 1.56 million acres overall when the tax is imposed on both commodities, while 3.2-million-acre feet (MAF) of consumed water, equivalent to 6.35 MAF of water withdrawals, are released from agriculture. These outcomes are due to sugarcane’s reduced use of land over two cropping seasons and significant changes in cropping patterns. The study also examined releases of water from other possible policy measures and found that an even tax rate of 30% on sugarcane, rice and cotton yields 8.73 MAF of water from agriculture. However, with a hotter, drier climate virtually all these releases of water disappear because water must stay in agriculture due to higher evaporation and less precipitation, which raises irrigation demands. The needed policies will go beyond just taxation and might include changing cropping patterns and irrigation practices, as well as development of drought resistant varieties. Other approaches, such as buying tubewells from farmers, and developing markets for nonagricultural purchases of water, may have a role. The role of international trade in sugar and rice is shown to be significant and should be considered further in these analyses.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; G Cross-cutting gender theme; DCA; Capacity Strengthening, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, There is little evidence on the association between women’s migration, empowerment, and well-being, driven in part due to difficulty in measuring empowerment in the migration context. To better understand these linkages, we developed a Women’s Empowerment in Migration Index (WEMI) and validated it with survey of 1019 returnee female migrants in Bangladesh, who had returned after working internationally, mostly from countries in West Asia. By incorporating indicators of subjective well-being from migration literature into measures of empowerment, our paper advances research over earlier assessments of women’s experiences in the migration process beyond seemingly objective indicators, such as income, health, and economic welfare. We find that 14% of all migrant women in our sample could be classified as being empowered. Lack of membership in groups, restricted mobility, and lack of asset ownership are the largest contributors to migrant women’s disempowerment in our sample. We find that WEMI is strongly correlated with other measures of well-being, including mental health and livelihood-efficacy. Women with higher empowerment scores are also less likely to experience discriminatory labor practices and unsafe work conditions. With broad applicability to migrants from low and middle-income countries, WEMI can be used as a tool, helping to identify sources of disempowerment, and enabling stakeholders to develop interventions targeting the welfare of women migrant workers.

Non-PR, IFPRI4; Reaching Smallholder Women; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; G Cross-cutting gender theme; CRP2, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies; PIM, CGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM), The project Reaching Smallholder Women with Information Services and Resilience Strategies to Respond to Climate Change aimed to increase the climate resilience of poor women and men farmers in Africa south of the Sahara and South Asia — especially those in Kenya, Uganda, and India — by overcoming the gendered information gap on accessing climate-smart agricultural (CSA) approaches. The project did this through piloting participatory video-based extension on CSA approaches with more than 30,000 farmers in the three countries. The notes in this collection summarize the key methods and findings from the study. It is hoped that they will inspire similar projects and programs that together will help eliminate the gap between rural men and women in resources, agency, and achievement once and for all.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; 2 Promoting Healthy Diets and Nutrition for all; Feed the Future Innovation Laboratory for Small-Scale Irrigation, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The Ethiopian Productive Safety Net Program (PSNP), launched in 2005 and operating in eight regional states, harmonizes the delivery of donor support to vulnerable populations experiencing chronic food insecurity and shocks. PSNP investments aim to improve food consumption and nutrition, while also protecting and developing assets for sustaining stable access to food. PSNP differentiates two types of beneficiaries: (1) Households with no able-bodied members that receive direct support in the form of cash transfers or in-kind support; and (2) Public work (PW) beneficiaries, who receive payments in exchange for work on various types of productive investments, such as watershed rehabilitation, irrigation, road and other infrastructure. This policy note summarizes results from an assessment of the impacts of PSNP investments supported by USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (BHA) in watershed rehabilitation and small-scale irrigation (SSI) on food security, nutrition and resilience in Amhara, Oromia, and Tigray regions of Ethiopia and Dire Dawa City administrative area between 2017 and 2021. The interventions assessed include area closures, SSI, other physical soil and water conservation practices, and overall watershed-level activities. Investments in SSI included construction of river-diversion schemes, lined canals, earthen canals, ponds and rainwater harvesting schemes. As watershed rehabilitation interventions take years to decades to show impacts, two time periods were used in the biophysical assessment: long-term changes, covering the period of 1984 to 2020, as well as short-term changes that specifically covered the period prior and during the USAID BHA program. The assessment combined socioeconomic analysis (quantitative and qualitative), as well as high-resolution remote sensing and biophysical modeling in selected watersheds. Remote sensing and biophysical mod eling provided insights on environmental effects and climate resilience of BHA’s watershed reh

Non-PR, IFPRI1; DCA; G Cross-cutting gender theme; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Much has been written about energy poverty, but there is relatively limited evidence of what determines the gender gap in energy poverty and how it can be overcome in rural areas. This study used Focus Group Discussions, in-depth interviews with farmers and Key Informant Interviews to analyze gendered information, access, adoption and use of rural energy technologies in the domestic and productive spheres. We find striking differences in how men and women adopt and use energy technologies in both spheres. Substantial asymmetries exist between women and men regarding knowledge of energy technologies, as most information about them is directed to men in the household. Even so, women are typically the primary decision-makers regarding energy technology adoption for domestic use, while men dominate decision-processes in the productive energy technology space. Women remain largely excluded from the adoption and use of agricultural energy technologies, even though they are heavily engaged in agricultural production systems. Our study highlights the need for tailored mechanisms that reach women with information on and means to acquire energy technologies as well as changes in gendered norms to ensure that women benefit equally from their use.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Reaching Smallholder Women, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Uganda is highly vulnerable to adverse impacts from climate change, including erratic rainfall patterns, prolonged droughts, and increased frequency of pests and diseases. While many climate-smart agricultural (CSA) practices have been identified, a gender gap in access to and adoption of these practices persists. This study tested par ticipatory video-based extension to reach underserved women and men farmers in parts of central Uganda and assessed its impacts on gendered awareness, knowledge, and adoption of CSA practices as well as women’s empowerment. We find limited impacts on awareness and knowledge and significant impacts for the adoption of several CSA practices. We also find some improvement in women’s decision-making but a decline in their group membership. We propose strategies to strengthen the uptake of CSA practices that can be implemented along side participatory video-based extension.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; SSSP; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Development Strategies and Governance (DSG); Transformation Strategies, Efficient water resources management is essential for the sustainable development of nations, and large dams are an important tool for achieving this endeavor. Here, we present an integrated approach to simulating the impacts of large dams, integrating river systems infrastructure, hydrodynamic, and economywide models. We apply the framework to examine the biophysical, GDP, and distributional impacts of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on Sudan.

Non-PR, IFPRI2; Feed the Future Innovation Laboratory for Small-Scale Irrigation; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Ghana is home to 32 million people, 13 million of whom live in rural areas and work mostly in agriculture. Although substantial progress has been made, food insecurity still affects a large share of the population; during 2019–2021 more than one third of the population experienced moderate or severe food insecurity, and in 2020 14% of children below the age of five were stunted.

Non-PR, IFPRI2; Feed the Future Innovation Laboratory for Small-Scale Irrigation; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Mali is home to 22 million people, 12 million of whom live in rural areas and work mostly in agriculture. Although remarkable progress has been made, food insecurity still affects a large share of the population; during 2019-2021, the prevalence of undernourishment in the population was 10%, and in 2020 26% of children below the age of five were stunted.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Access to safe, clean water is a basic human right. But water scarcity or barriers to access can cause conflict within and between countries. Fights over water can be expected to intensify as the world warms, evaporation increases and rainfall becomes less predictable. So we’ll need to work even harder to resolve disputes and share this precious resource.

Non-PR, DCA; IFPRI1; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The potential for profitable groundwater irrigated area development in Nigeria is 5.04 million hectares (ha), almost all of it located in the country’s central and northern states. To develop this vast area, granular water budgets, financial service provision and support to grow sustainability of production will be needed. Increasing temperature, erratic rainfall, and other extreme events, such as floods and droughts, pose severe threats to development in Nigeria, and particularly in central and northern Nigeria where rainfall is limited, natural resources are threatened by degradation and agriculture, including livestock production, is the major economic driver. Climate change has significant adverse impacts on agricultural production and livelihoods, making the regions’ poor and disadvantaged people even more vulnerable. Agricultural productivity is already affected by climate extreme events and further land expansion would increase degradation and deforestation. At the same time, the central and northern regions of the country are blessed with substantial underground water resources that have been barely tapped. At this point, the potential of farmer-led irrigation, a system where farmers acquire the irrigation technology and access to a water source themselves, is barely exploited. What role could farmer-led, small-scale irrigation play in growing agricultural productivity, rural employment and incomes, and reducing climate stress? And what mechanisms are needed to make this happen?

Non-PR, IFPRI5; DCA; Capacity Strengthening; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 5 Strengthening Institutions and Governance, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, In less than one year the Niger Basin Authority, an intergovernmental body tasked with the sustainable development of the Niger waters and associated resources, passed the first ever nexus policy in a transboundary river basin, contributing to a true acceleration of change for improved water and associated development in the Niger River Basin. The guidelines were developed in close collaboration with the nine basin countries and complemented by a large capacity building program. Using the guidelines can reduce the threat of adverse impacts on the Basin’s shared water and land resources and save millions of dollars of investment funds, while meeting various Shared Vision objectives. Doing so can also help strengthen positive impacts, reduce crosssectoral constraints of single-sector solutions, and identify multisector solutions. Application of the nexus guidelines will increase the efficiency of natural resources use and support implementation and monitoring of (multipurpose) investments. If this can be achieved, the River of Rivers—thought to be the original meaning of the name Niger—will continue to enhance water, food and energy security, and environmental sustainability for generations to come. To support the application of the guidelines, the study team developed an online, simplified nexus assessment tool that is summarized in Appendix 4.

Non-PR, IFPRI3; Cross-cutting gender theme, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Women and girls in poorer countries are affected in particular ways by the multiple crises the world is currently facing. Uncovering the linkages between gender, resilience and food security, our authors look at ways to support women and girls’ capacity to respond to crises and make them more resilient. They also explore what can be done to address underlying gender inequalities.

PR, IFPRI2; G Cross-cutting gender theme; Feed the Future Initiative; GCAN, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The COVID-19 pandemic has had far-reaching impacts in every part of the world, including on vulnerable populations in rural areas of low- and middle-income countries. This report explores the ways in which men and women in rural areas of four countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)—Kenya, Niger, Rwanda, and Uganda—experienced the COVID-19 pandemic and associated income losses, as well as their responses to the crisis. To identify and monitor the differential effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women and men in rural households, IFPRI conducted phone surveys in selected regions of the four focal countries, with financial and technical support from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The surveys traced gender differences in responses to the pandemic and associated restrictions, such as choice of coping strategies, access to public assistance, and changes in the care burden for men and women.

PR, IFPRI3; ISI; DCA; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; 5 Strengthening Institutions and Governance; IFPRIOA, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, CONTEXT: India's agricultural systems are increasingly affected by climate change's adverse effects. The Government of India has an impressive set of programs to address this issue, but they have substantial shortcomings, especially in reaching women farmers. OBJECTIVE: We aim to understand policy and implementation gaps in reaching women farmers with climate-smart agriculture (CSA) practices and study how women and men farmer's different roles in agriculture shape their needs and access to complementary services needed to adapt to climate change. METHODS: An extensive review of India's agriculture and climate policies and program and a series of focus group discussions with farmers in Gujarat, India to discuss constraints and potential entry points for better reaching women farmers with CSA practices. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Women's increased vulnerability to climate change and reduced access to CSA practices can be attributed to limited land ownership, poor access to credit, reduced access to information and formal extension, and multiple pressures on their time. Village cooperatives and self-help groups can be leveraged to support women's access to agricultural information and adoption of CSA practices. SIGNIFICANCE: This paper highlights constraints to information and extension access by Indian women farmers that could impede the widespread adoption of CSA practices. It fills an important knowledge gap in designing gender-responsive policies and inclusive agricultural extension systems to promote adoption of CSA practices among smallholder farmers.

Non-PR, IFPRI4; Food Security Portal, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Development agencies are pouring in billions of dollars to address the global food crisis exacerbated by Rus sia’s war on Ukraine. The World Bank, the G7, the European Union’s Team Europe, and the United States have collectively pledged more than $40 billion to avert food and humanitarian crises. Yet this much-needed assis tance carries its own risks. Without a gender lens, the proposed measures will fail to meet the specific needs of women and girls and might worsen existing gender inequalities. The current crisis presents an opportunity to design gender-responsive programs that buffer women and girls against hardships in the short term and tackle entrenched gender inequalities while building resilience to future shocks over the long term. It is a perilous moment for women and girls around the world. The COVID-19 pandemic already pushed an estimated additional 47 million girls and women into extreme poverty, reversing decades of progress. And in 2021, at least 150 million more women than men were experiencing food insecurity — with the gender gap continuing to grow. Crises pose particular risks to girls, leading to them to drop out of school at higher rates, and increasing the incidence of gender-based violence, including early or forced marriage and economic or sexual exploitation.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; DCA; G Cross-cutting gender theme; Capacity Strengthening; WIF-2, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Jordan’s garment sector employs a large number of women migrants from South Asia who face various challenges and vulnerabilities in their work environment. The COVID-19 pandemic has further exacerbated some of these vulnerabilities, leading to income losses. However, little information is available about this migration corridor. This study implemented qualitative phone survey interviews with returnee women migrants in Bangladesh to identify interventions that the organizations, such as the International Labor Organization and other actors supporting women’s safe migration could undertake to reduce women’s vulnerabilities in migration. The study identified networks of discipline and power, the perception of appropriate behavior at work and beyond and racialization as key areas that mediate vulnerabilities of women. We recommend increasing awareness of conditions at Jordan’s garment sector as part of pre-departure training, which is supported by the main recruitment practice of garment workers through BOESL in the country. Awareness raising includes information on the role of the Al Hassan Workers’ Center as well as on the role of the embassy of Bangladesh in Jordan. A second recommendation is to translate contractual documents into Bengali so that women migrants can better understand work conditions, including salaries. The final recommendation focuses on the need to continue research on the uneven power dynamics in Jordan’s garment sector to support dismantling networks of discrimination and power and racialization of the work environment.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; DCA; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; 5 Strengthening Institutions and Governance; G Cross-cutting gender theme; Capacity Strengthening; Feed the Future Ethiopia; Feed the Future Initiative, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The goal of this study is to assess the potential of game-based experiential learning in raising awareness and stimulating discussions about groundwater resource systems, the social dilemma in groundwater management, and the need for institutional arrangements (rules) governing this shared resource, as well as whether such awareness and community discussions lead to actual change in groundwater governance in Ethiopia. Groundwater management is highly complex, with many users sharing the same resource often without realizing their interconnectedness. Behavioral experiments (games) that simulate real-life common-pool resource use have shown promise as an experiential learning tool for improving resource governance. This study pilots an experiential learning intervention in Ethiopia using a groundwater gameto help raise awareness of groundwater over-extraction and improve understanding of the importance of collective action in governance. The Meki River catchment in rural Ethiopia is a unique context where small-scale irrigation is expanding, but overextraction and competition over groundwater have not yet reached alarming levels. The groundwater game, adapted from Meinzen-Dick et al. (2016 and 2018), was played in 15 villages, accompanied by community-wide debriefing discussions in each village after the game to reflect on the process and lessons learned, and to stimulate discussions around groundwater governance. We carried out participant surveys to capture individual mental models regarding groundwater use and management, as well as any immediate learning effects. Focus group discussions were held in each village prior to the intervention to establish a baseline and again six months after the intervention to assess possible lasting effects. The findings indicate cognitive, normative and relational learning, including increased understanding of groundwater dynamics (such as the joint effect of diverse water uses and users), the importance of collective action in res

PR, IFPRI3; ISI; Capacity Strengthening; 5 Strengthening Institutions and Governance, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Freshwater resources (FWRs) are under enormous stress due to human activities and climate change. Given the centrality of local communities in managing natural resources, community-based conservation (CBC) for FWRs (fCBC) offers a mechanism for addressing these challenges. A framework informing fCBC that incorporates unique features of FWRs (such as being fugitive resources, having increased risk of negative externalities, and sheer spatial coverage) is needed to unlock CBC’s potential in achieving environmental and developmental impacts in freshwater contexts. We critically review and synthesize existing research adapting The Nature Conservancy’s Voice, Choice and Action framework, organized around four pillars (Secure rights and fair externality consideration; Strong community capacity; Effective multi-stakeholder platforms; Sustainable livelihood and development opportunities) and two cross-cutting elements (Cultural connections; Equity and power balancing), and provide recommendations on ways to strengthen facilitation and support community empowerment in fCBC. We report on how applying the framework during a conservation planning process for fCBC projects in four geographies provides important insights for developing robust CBC programs.

PR, IFPRI3; ISI; DCA; Capacity Strengthening; IFPRIOA; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Mongolia’s projected warming is far above the global average and could exceed 5 °C by the end of the century. The reliance on pastoral livestock and rainfed agriculture along with its fragile ecosystems put Mongolia’s economy at risk of adverse climate change impacts, particularly from climate extreme events. Eighty percent of Mongolia’s agricultural sector is concentrated in animal husbandry with around one third of the population relying on this livelihood. Beyond livestock, food production is concentrated in few crops: wheat; potatoes; and three vegetables (cabbage, carrot, and turnip). Climate change does not only affect food production but can exacerbate malnutrition by removing food and nutrients in all stages of the food value chain. To identify perceived effects of climate change and measures to reduce climate change impacts in Mongolia's’s key food value chains, we implemented focus group discussions with 214 livestock and vegetable producers, traders, and food consumers. We also conducted 30 key informant interviews at the soum, provincial, and national levels across four agroecosystems in three provinces. Based on this community engagement analysis, we identify interventions that the government and private sector, including herders and farmers, should undertake to increase the food security and nutrition of the country’s prioritized food value chains under climate change.

PR, IFPRI3; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; ISI, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Soil erosion and subsequent land degradation undermine efforts to ensure food security and environmental sustainability in Ethiopia. The government of Ethiopia has implemented extensive soil and water conservation (SWC) programs in severely degraded and food-insecure areas of the country, in some cases integrated with subsequent or parallel irrigation development. However, the effectiveness of these interventions has not been extensively evaluated. This study, therefore, evaluates the performance and impacts of SWC practices in terms of improving vegetation greenness and reducing soil erosion in Feresmay watershed in Ethiopia. Long-term Landsat-based Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE), and Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) were used for change-detection analysis before and after the implementation of various SWC interventions. The results revealed the positive impacts of SWC interventions in improving the vegetation greenness and soil erosion reduction although the outcome varied by intervention. Increased vegetation greenness was observed largely in areas where area closure with catchment treatment (ACCT) and impacts of irrigation (IRR) interventions are dominant, while relatively little impact was observed at the watershed level analysis. Although these interventions helped to reduce soil loss, the results highlighted the need for more SWC interventions to minimise further soil loss.

PR, IFPRI2; DCA; Cross-cutting gender theme, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The Gender-Sensitive Risks and Options Assessment for Decision Making (ROAD) to Support WiF-2 (ROAD migration project), a partnership coordinated by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Australian National University, American University Beirut, Lincoln University, and University of Dhaka, evaluated the ILO-DFID Partnership Programme on Fair Recruitment and Decent Work for Women Migrant Workers in South Asia and the Middle East (Work in Freedom, Phase 2 project [WiF-2]), which operated from 2018 to 2023. The WiF-2 project specifically aimed “to reduce vulnerability to trafficking and forced labour of women and girls across migration pathways leading to the care sector and textiles, clothing, leather and footwear industries (TCLFI) of South Asia and Arab States” (ToC WiF-2). In this context, the International Labour Organization (ILO) describes three dimensions to forced labour: (i) unfree recruitment; (ii) work and life under duress; and (iii) impossibility to leave employer. Forced labour exists if any one of these dimensions exists. Exploitation relates to one or all of the following three elements: (i) restricting freedom of movement; (ii) economic exploitation; and (iii) violence or the threat of violence. Trafficking relates to migrants’ interactions with a network of individuals who organize the migration process, including brokers in origin countries and employment agencies, as well as employers in destination countries, with elements of deception, coercion, debt bondage, and slavery-like conditions. Trafficking also includes involuntary child labour. To address women and girl’s vulnerability to forced labour, exploitation, and trafficking, the WiF-2 program implemented pre-migration outreach interventions in countries of origin (Bangladesh, India, and Nepal). At the micro-level, this included training of a group of social workers who would engage women, girls, and other community members in countries of origin through door-to-door visits

PR, IFPRI3; ISI; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies

PR, IFPRI5; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Cross-cutting gender theme, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, CGIAR Gender Platform, Climate change affects every aspect of the food system, including all nodes along agrifood value chains from production to consumption, the food environments in which people live, and outcomes, such as diets and livelihoods. Women and men often have specific roles and responsibilities within food systems, yet structural inequalities (formal and informal) limit women’s access to resources, services and agency. These inequalities affect the ways in which women and men experience and are affected by climate change. In addition to gender, other social factors are at play, such as age, education, marital status, and health and economic conditions. To date, most climate change policies, investments, and interventions do not adequately integrate gender. If climate-smart and climate-resilient interventions do not adequately take gender differences into account, they might exacerbate gender inequalities in food systems by, for instance, increasing women’s labor burden and time poverty, reducing their access to and control over income and assets, and reducing their decision-making power. At the same time, women’s contributions are critical to make food systems more resilient to the negative impacts of climate change, given their specialized knowledge, skills and roles in agrifood systems, within the household, at work and at the community level. Increasing the resilience of food systems requires going beyond addressing gendered vulnerabilities to climate change to create an enabling environment that supports gender equality and women’s empowerment, by removing structural barriers and rigid gender norms, and building equal power dynamics, as part of a process of gender -transformative change.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; Cross-cutting gender theme; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, The evidence on the potential for agricultural interventions to contribute to improved nutrition has grown considerably over the past decade. Numerous studies have explored both positive and negative effects of agriculture on nutrition and health. The Innovation Lab for Small Scale Irrigation has helped to fill the evidence gap on small-scale irrigation and nutrition linkages. The studies, implemented by the International Food Policy Research Institute and national partners, examine the potential of smallscale irrigation as a nutrition-sensitive investment. Through this work, more development partners are recognizing the interconnections and beginning to design irrigation investments to intentionally improve nutritional and health outcomes.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; Cross-cutting gender theme; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Widespread use of small power pumps in South Asia has revolutionized agricultural production since the 1970s. In the past few years, solar photovoltaic pumps have become affordable alternatives to diesel and grid-powered electric pumps. While their initial investment is higher, the near-zero operating costs make them extremely attractive (Xie et al. 2021; Lefore et al. 2021). They have additional benefits, including reducing the national fuel import bill; and producing no greenhouse gases. Small solar-powered pumps are portable and can be used for many purposes. India, among others, is investing billions of Indian Rupees in subsidies to ramp up their use; and partnerships among private firms, NGOs, governments, researchers, and investors are trying to expand their uptake in sub-Saharan Africa. A major downside is that most irrigation pumps are being acquired by relatively wealthy male farmers, exacerbating already high levels of inequality in rural communities. Poor smallholders, especially women, cannot meet the required credit checks and therefore cannot purchase the pumps. Nor do they have access to finance to purchase complementary inputs such as fertilizer and seeds. In response, various research institutions, pump manufacturers, and NGOs are exploring how to target irrigation pumps to poor smallholders, women, and youth. Many studies and pilot programs have been implemented and shown positive results. The challenge is to scale out the successful pilots based on lessons learned. This brief explores the lessons learned and identifies potential ways forward.

Non-PR, IFPRI5; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Individual farmer investments have the potential to fill the gap in public investments and be more cost-effective than large-scale irrigation. However, this development primarily occurs outside of formal systems. Water depletion and declining water quality in some areas of Africa and Southeast Asia suggest the need for careful planning and monitoring of small-scale irrigation to support resilience and avoid maladaptation. ILSSI research partners sought to support decision-makers to understand where and how water can be sustainably used by small-scale irrigators, employing and strengthening capacity for tools to manage competing demands and mitigate the risks to water security. Research partnerships also guided organizations and companies to deploy solar irrigation technologies based on biophysical and socio-economic suitability. Working with farmers, water users, and extension services, the project aimed to improve on-farming water management practices and engage communities to help safeguard water resources.

Non-PR, IFPRI2; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 2 Promoting Healthy Diets and Nutrition for all; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Unlike large-acreage government irrigation schemes, small-scale irrigation is typically farmer led. Farmers decide what technologies to use to extract water, be it manual lifting or solar water pumps. They also choose the mode of irrigation, whether by buckets or drip kits. Farmers purchase, run and maintain the operation themselves on their own farms or as part of small groups of farmers. Small-scale irrigation can help smallholder farmers to increase agricultural productivity and incomes. It can be scaled quickly and without large public investments. For these reasons, it can contribute more rapidly to the achievement of national agricultural and development goals, compared to large irrigation schemes.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; DCA; ReSAKSS, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Irrigation is increasingly being called upon to help stabilize and grow food and water security in the face of multiple crises; these crises include climate change, but also recent global food and energy price crises, including the 2007/08 food and energy price crises, and the more recent crises triggered by the COVID 19 pandemic and the war on Ukraine. While irrigation development used to focus on public, large-scale, surface- and reservoir-fed systems, over the last several decades, private small-scale investments in groundwater irrigation have grown in importance and are expected to see rapid future growth, particularly in connection with solar-powered pumping systems. But is irrigation ‘fit-for-purpose’ to support population growth, economic development, and multiple food, energy and climate crises? This paper reviews how fit-for-purpose irrigation is with a focus on economies of scale of surface and groundwater systems, and a particular examination of systems in Sub-Saharan Africa where the need for expansion is largest. The review finds challenges for both larger surface and smaller groundwater systems in the face of growing demand for irrigated agriculture and dwindling and less reliable water supplies. To support resilience of the sector, we propose both a holistic design and management improvement agenda for larger surface systems, and a series of suggestions to improve sustainability concerns of groundwater systems

Non-PR, IFPRI2; Cross-cutting gender theme; DCA; ROAD Wif2, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, CGIAR Gender Platform, There is ample data and literature that shows how women’s experiences in low-paid, short-term migration vary from those of men, and that experiences are linked to women’s empowerment – captured by the interrelated dimensions of resources, agency, and achievements. While considerable attention is paid to understanding the generalized notion of women’s empowerment, it is also key to distinguish empowerment in specific realms, including economic empowerment, agriculture, health and nutrition, and migration. To better understand the agency of female migrants, a Women’s Empowerment in Migration Index (WEMI) was developed. This brief discusses work to assess this index with data from women migrants in the Bangladesh to West Asia migration corridor.

PR, IFPRI3; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; IMPACT, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies

Non-PR, IFPRI5; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; DCA, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Mongolia is severely affected by adverse climate change impacts, including substantially higher temperatures that have contributed to increased evapotranspiration and the drying up of the country’s water resources. Moreover, the number and intensity of extreme events--especially droughts--is growing, with largest impacts on the poorer population employed in agriculture. At the same time, nutrition security remains out of reach with the co-existence of multiple forms of malnutrition, including obesity. The Mongolian pastoral culture is important to consider in balancing nutritional requirements, health risks, economics, sustainability of food production, including greenhouse gas emissions. While linkages between climate change and food security are increasingly understood, in particular the direct impacts of climate change on crop yields, associated higher food prices, and increased costs of healthy diets resulting in higher levels of malnutrition, other linkages between climate change and nutrition have been barely studied. Mongolia thus suffers from the syndemic of climate change, obesity and undernutrition, which are three co-occurring and interlinked epidemics. A better and more comprehensive understanding of the linkages between climate change and nutrition is key to developing effective interventions to ensure that Mongolia’s population has access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food despite adverse climate outcomes. Importantly, climate change does not only affect food production but can exacerbate malnutrition by removing food and nutrients in all stages of the food value chain. Finally, given the important contribution of food systems to climate change, nutrition policy in Mongolia should more proactively consider environmental impacts.

Non-PR, IFPRI4; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; Cross-cutting gender theme; GCAN, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Research on the gender dimensions of resilience highlights differences in the ways that men and women experience disturbances, their resilience capacities, and their preferred responses. This chapter incorporates a food systems lens into a gender and resilience framework to identify key entry points to strengthen women’s and men’s food security and nutrition in the face of multiple, reoccurring shocks and stressors. Drawing on systematic reviews and case studies from the literature, this chapter finds that exposure and sensitivity to disturbances depend largely on gendered roles in food systems, including along agricultural value chains, and the food environments in which men and women live. Increasing women’s resilience capacities—which tend to be lower than men’s—through investments in education, information and financial services, employment opportunities, and women’s agency, can improve food security and nutrition outcomes and increase their contribution to food system resilience. Considering gender differences in needs and preferences in policy and intervention design is, therefore, essential to ensure that investments reach, benefit, and empower women as agents of change for greater resilience.

Non-PR, 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; IFPRI4; DCA, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Access to sufficient and clean freshwater is essential for all life. Water is also essential for the functioning of food systems: as a key input into food production, but also in processing and preparation, and as a food itself. Water scarcity and pollution are growing, affecting poorer populations most, and particularly food producers. Malnutrition levels are also on the rise, and this is closely linked to water scarcity. The achievement of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) 2 and 6 are co-dependent. Solutions for jointly improving food systems and water security outcomes include: (1) strengthening efforts to retain water-based ecosystems and their functions; (2) improving agricultural water management for better diets for all; (3) reducing water and food losses beyond the farmgate; (4) coordinating water with nutrition and health interventions; (5) increasing the environmental sustainability of food systems; (6) explicitly addressing social inequities in water-nutrition linkages; and (7) improving data quality and monitoring for water-food system linkages, drawing on innovations in information and communications technology (ICT). Climate change and other environmental and societal changes make the implementation and scaling of solutions more urgent than ever.

PR, IFPRI3; DCA; G Cross-cutting gender theme; ROAD Wif2, EPTD; Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR); Transformation Strategies, Millions of short-term, low-skilled women migrant workers from South-Asia to West-Asia experience exploitative and unsafe conditions. We review evidence from literature and interview 18 key informants to assess the exploitation migrant women face, and highlight the impacts of past interventions to determine their potential, and realised effectiveness, in reducing forced labour and trafficking. We find that women face varied precarious situations along the migration pathway, including interactions with recruiters in the home country, incurring debt, pre-departure formalities and training, withheld wages and mobility restrictions. We discuss varying degrees of success of mechanisms that aim to reduce vulnerability to forced labour.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; CRP2; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; 5 Strengthening Institutions and Governance; Cross-cutting gender theme; Capacity Strengthening, EPTD; PIM, CGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM), India’s agricultural systems are increasingly affected by the adverse effects of climate change. While the Government of India has put together an impressive set of programs to address climate change impacts on agriculture, substantial shortcomings of these programs have been identified, especially in reaching women farmers. Women’s increased vulnerability to climate change and reduced access to climate smart agricultural practices can be attributed to limited land ownership, poor access to credit, reduced access to information and formal extension, and time pressures from multiple domestic and productive demands on their time. We undertake an extensive policy review of India’s agriculture and climate policies and program, and supplement that with a series of focus group discussions with women and men farmers in Gujarat to discuss constraints and potential entry points for better reaching women farmers with climate smart agriculture practices. Village cooperatives and self-help groups can be key intermediary organizations that can support women’s access at the local, state and country level.

Non-PR, IFPRI1; GCAN; Gender and Social Inequality; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; CRP7; Feed the Future Initiative; G Cross-cutting gender theme, EPTD, CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS), Agriculture is strongly affected by environmental factors, including variability in temperature and precipitation, which in turn shape the livelihoods farmers derive. In this context, the intensity of engagement in agriculture is directly influenced by temperature and rainfall patterns (ILO 2018). Both extreme weather shocks (that is, heat waves, droughts, and floods) and weather variability (that is, changes in temperature and rainfall patterns) can significantly disrupt participation in agriculture and related sectors, particularly when farmers’ capacity to cope with and adapt to these shocks is low. This policy note summarizes the results of a study designed to quantify the impact of climate variability and extreme weather shocks on the intensity of individuals’ participation in the agricultural sector in Africa, where intra-annual weather variability is high, and dependence on rainfed agriculture is significant. The study specifically focused on changes in the number of weekly hours worked in response to weather variability and climate extremes, and explored both the impact on women’s participation and their potential to mitigate the negative effects of these shocks.

Non-PR, IFPRI1, EPTD, CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE), Lake Beseka is a shallow, saline, endorheic lake in the East African Rift Valley of Ethiopia that has dramatically grown in size due to large-scale irrigation development in its catchment area. Recent artificial connections of the lake with the Awash River system to contain lake size have led to a series of changes and impacts on different water users, but are not reflected in lake and Awash River governance and institutions. Understanding who are the key actors affecting Lake Beseka and strengthening their linkages can help identify solutions that sustainably contain or reduce the lake’s size, improve its water quality, and address costs to nearby and downstream populations as well as the environment. Thus, this study analyzed qualitative data collected from net-mapping – a network analysis that identifies actors or stakeholders as well as linkages and relative power positions among stakeholders. The resulting network reflects the complexity of the water governance system including upstream actors who affect the size and quality of the lake as well as downstream actors who suffer from adverse consequences. The Awash Basin Development Authority, Metehara Sugar Factory, regional bureaus, and federal ministries were identified as the most influential actors affecting how Lake Beseka is used and managed. Actors most affected by the lake expansion and quality problems such as downstream communities currently have no role in the governance of the lake. Metehara Municipality, woreda offices, research institutes, and farmers were considered to have moderate influence. Stakeholders who participated in the net-mapping workshops identified flooding, salinity, water-related conflict, and health effects as the four main challenges of the lake. The study suggests that developing multi-stakeholder partnerships or platforms across most influential and most affected actors could support a more comprehensive understanding of the multiple challenges Lake Beseka is posing. It could al

Non-PR, IFPRI1; CRP5; REACH; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, EPTD, CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE), We investigate whether a large-scale watershed program promoting sustainable land management (SLM) in Ethiopia increases adoption of SLM and its benefits on plots owned by women in male-headed households compared to plots owned by their spouses, jointly owned plots as well as plots of female headed households (FHH). The analysis is based on a survey of 500 households and 2900 plots conducted in the Abbay basin of Ethiopia where the SLM program was implemented between 2012 and 2017. Our findings show that the SLM program significantly increased adoption of SLM practices (soil bunds, stone terraces, mulching) in male-headed households but that adoption was centered on jointly owned plots and male-owned plots, with no significant adoption on women-owned plots. The results also show that women in male-headed households are more constrained to participate in SLM programs compared to their counterparts in FHH. Results further show that although FHH were less likely than male-headed households to adopt SLM in watersheds with no SLM interventions, the SLM program significantly increased adoption of soil bunds on plots in FHH. SLM adoption and impacts can likely be further strengthened if a focus on removing women’s constraints is added.

PR, IFPRI3; ISI; 1 Fostering Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply, EPTD, The 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim at jointly improving economic, social, and environmental outcomes for human prosperity and planetary health. However, designing national economic policies that support advancement across multiple Sustainable Development Goals is hindered by the complexities of multi-sector economies and often conflicting policies. To address this, we introduce a national-scale design framework that can enable policymakers to sift through complex, non-linear, multi-sector policy spaces to identify efficient policy portfolios that balance economic, social, and environmental goals. The framework combines economy-wide sustainability simulation and artificial intelligence-driven multiobjective, multi-SDG policy search and machine learning. The framework can support multi-sector, multi-actor policy deliberation to screen efficient policy portfolios. We demonstrate the utility of the framework for a case study of Egypt by identifying policy portfolios that achieve efficient mixes of poverty and inequality reduction, economic growth, and climate change mitigation. The results show that integrated policy strategies can help achieve sustainable development while balancing adverse economic, social, and political impacts of reforms.