CGIAR CAC Program

How can farmers adapt to climate change while facing conflict and instability?

A new global study featuring International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas - ICARDA’s Dr. Boubaker Dhehibi reveals that access to training, extension services, trusted information, and financial support are key to helping farmers adopt climate-smart agriculture in fragile regions.

The research also highlights major gaps in access to risk-reduction tools such as agricultural insurance, despite their importance in building resilience.

➡️ Read the full study: repo.mel.cgiar.org/items/103f3979-28b3-4dfb-afdc-4c1dbe05e926

From flower to flower, pollinators carry the weight of feeding the world on their wings while protecting global food systems and biodiversity. On May 20th, the world honors bees, pollinators with an impact far greater than their size.

Three-quarters of the world's most important food crops and 87% of all flowering plants depend on pollinators. Bees and their kin are foundational to biodiversity at every level: the genetic diversity of plant populations, the diversity of species across ecosystems, and the integrity of habitats that sustain all terrestrial life. Yet pollinator populations are under growing pressure. Climate change, habitat degradation, unsustainable land use, and the excessive use of agrochemicals are accelerating their decline across many regions, threatening food production, biodiversity, and the livelihoods of millions of rural farming communities.

➡️ Read more:

The Pollinator Effect- World Bee Day 2026 | ICARDA Pollinators carry the weight of feeding the world on their wings while protecting global food systems and biodiversity. On May 20th, the world honors bees on World Bee Day, pollinators with an impact far greater than their size.

Hunger today is no longer simply a failure of food production, but increasingly a consequence of conflict.

Conflict destroys infrastructure, displaces communities, and fractures supply chains. It drives up energy costs, which feed directly into fertilizer markets, raising agricultural input prices, reducing application rates, and ultimately lowering yields. This then translates into not only higher food prices, but also a gradual weakening of production systems. Climate extremes compound these pressures, while economic instability limits households' ability to absorb rising prices. Each of these forces is damaging on its own, but together, they are destabilizing.

Around 673 million people worldwide experienced hunger in 2024, roughly 8.2% of the global population. In 2025, some 2.3 billion people faced moderate or severe food insecurity, and over 2.6 billion people could not afford a healthy diet. Conflict and climate shocks remain the primary regional drivers, with more than 87 million people facing hunger in East and Southern Africa and 52 million projected to be acutely food insecure in West and Central Africa by mid-2026.

➡️ Read the Opinion Piece by Aly Abousabaa, Director General, International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas - ICARDA:

Food Systems Under Strain: Navigating Conflict, Climate, and Scarcity | ICARDA Food insecurity today is no longer driven by scarcity alone, but by the convergence of conflict, climate, and economic instability, reshaping not only what we produce, but who can access it.