Loss is endemic in vegetable production in Indonesia. Our study conducted with the Center of System, a logistics thinktank in Jakarta, found that up to 51 percent of the cabbage farmed on Java fails to reach market stalls or shop shelves. This, in what is by far Indonesia’s most populous and prosperous island: across the country, vegetable losses can exceed 60 percent. (A separate study has put food loss and waste in the country at 48 million tonnes, which would work out to 175 kg per Indonesian per year.) 

Why does this matter? For one thing, because cabbage, chilies and shallots – the three vegetables covered by our study – loom large enough in the average Javan’s shopping basket to hike up inflation and squeeze family budgets. But also because a high-income aspiring country can hardly make that status leap with such distortions in vital supply chains.

We have a few suggestions to turn things around.

The quantity of fish and other aquatic foods farmed around the world has grown
fifteen-fold since 1980 to over 120 million tonnes. Expansion has been particularly fast in Africa – fast enough for governments to include aquaculture in their development and poverty reduction plans. Which is great news in a longer-term, macro sort of way. But what of the six million Africans putting in the work? Who are they? And what are their rights and conditions? 

This analysis of aquaculture employment governance in 10 countries has turned up a mixed bag. Parts are encouraging: the workforce tends to be young and educated, with no evidence of forced child labour. Then again, aquaculture tends to be split between a range of ministries, with a lack of sector-specific regulations, and not much equity or transparency.

The promise is huge; the present looks messy. 

 

Do social protection programmes trigger more climate-friendly practices among smallholder farmers? The verdict emerging from FAO's literature review of the topic is umm, yeah, probably. 

There is some evidence from Malawi, for example, that paying people cash benefits may increase their tolerance for risk, such as switching to organic fertilizer; or from Ethiopia, that in-kind food aid results in more recourse to soil and water conservation techniques. Other research nuances this: it suggests that transfers are generally too low to induce behavioural change, and that they may only do so in conjunction with other incentives such as access to credit and agricultural extension services. 

This is not to cast doubt, of course, on the notion that social protection is a good thing per se, critically for the most vulnerable. But it seems too soon to make an argument for its automatic correlation with climate-smart agriculture, in the absence of other policies and irrespective of context.