Thematic Track: True Value of Food: A Call to Action to Solve Climate Change and other Crises

Transforming food systems is critical to address climate change and other global crises. The convergence of the four crises of climate change, COVID-19, conflicts and associated high costs (“4 Cs”) more urgent than ever require agri-food systems to be sustainable and resilient.
In this thematic track, current approaches to assess the success or profitability of food production, processing, and consumption do not reflect the full costs of these activities on such areas as health, climate, and equity were discussed.
“The price we pay for food does not reflect its true cost. Thus, true cost accounting is one way of identifying the true value of food. There is a growing concern over the negative environmental and health impacts of intensive rice and wheat cultivation in India. Farmer suicide is a major issue in India and people do put value to people’s lives,” said Dr Raghav Puri, who gave the keynote address on behalf of Dr Prabhu Pingali.
In the course of the conversation, Mr Reuben Gergan highlighted how TEEB presents a method for TCA of measuring the true value of ecosystems and benefits society. “TEEB’s main objective is mainstreaming the value of biodiversity services and the ecosystem services for decision-making. TEEB agrifood framework would be most relevant in studying policy interventions on organic farming and agroforestry. Scattered data and data unavailability are major hindrances in TEEB’s framework. Thus, in order to have an efficient TCA, there is a need in developing the capacity of institutions to strengthen the data,” added Mr Reuben Gergan.

Thematic Track: True Value of Food: A Call to Action to Solve Climate Change and other Crises
WSDS 2023 | Group C | Silver Oak 2
Keynote Address: Dr Raghav Puri, Postdoctoral Associate, Tata Cornell Institute, Cornell University (delivered the Keynote Address on behalf of Dr Prabhu Pingali, Tata Cornell Institute)
Panelists:
Mr Anupam Ravi, GIST Impact, Senior Vice President
Dr Shariqua Yunus, World Food Programme India, Head of Unit & Programme Officer (Health and Nutrition) Delhi
Mr Reuben Gergan, UNEP, Biodiversity Consultant

To know more about WSDS 2023, visit: http://wsds.teriin.org/
#WSDS2023 #Act4Earth #SustainableDevelopment