Food Systems Integrated Program

In December 2024, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) launched a new program, aimed at strengthening efforts to transform global agrifood systems – from farm to table – so that they are sustainable, nature positive, resilient, inclusive and pollution-free.

Funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the Food Systems Integrated Program (FSIP) was launched on Agrifood System Day at the 16th Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD COP16) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It targets agrifood systems of four sectors – crops (maize, rice and wheat), commodities (cocoa, palm oil and soy), livestock and aquaculture – across 32 countries and will channel 282 million US dollars in GEF financing and an estimated USD 1.8 billion of co-financing.

Through the programme, countries and communities are to develop and strengthen policies, value chains, practices, and investment plans for key agrifood sectors. The programme aims to mitigate methane emissions in the livestock and rice sectors, as well as deforestation in livestock and palm oil sectors. It will promote aquaculture as an alternative source of protein and income and integrated landscape management as an alternative to unsustainable land use in producing wheat and maize. In addition, it will support sustainable practices for key commodities to ensure long-term environmental and economic benefits.

The program comes amid growing international attention to the key role of food and agriculture systems at the recent UN environmental Conferences of the Parties (COPs) for three different conventions. These include the launch of the Agri-NBSAPs Initiative at the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) COP16 and of the Harmoniya Initiative at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP29. All three COPs have prominently featured discussions on financing – agrifood systems accounted for less than five per cent of total global climate finance in 2019/2020 and 23 per cent of the total climate-related development finance in 2022, a decline from 37 per cent in the previous decade.

The Global Coordination Project will support the design and launch of 32 country projects over the next 12 months. Global coordination hubs on policy and governance, private sector and investment, landscape-level – farmland, agroforestry sites and other non-protected areas – innovation, and knowledge management will build communities of practice and enhance coordination throughout the duration of the programme to generate greater impact than the sum of individual country projects.

(IFAD/ile)

Read more on the IFAD website