By Tom Ellison and Noah Fritzhand
On 22 October, the Center for Climate and Security brought together current and former US government officials, scientists, and researchers to discuss two topics that the Feeding Resilience program has identified as essential to progress at the nexus of food systems, climate change, and US national security: improved US government interagency coordination and better deployment of strategic foresight capabilities. The discussion was held under the Chatham House Rule.
Participants first discussed how the United States can better synchronize across development, diplomatic, defense, and humanitarian programs, leverage expertise in places like the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), and apply the new Framework for Climate Resilience and Security to food. The group also discussed how the United States can best use and fill gaps between capabilities like climate projections, the Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWSNET), and intelligence and political stability assessments to more holistically anticipate food- and climate-related security issues. Several themes emerged from the discussion:
- Collaboration and lessons learned: The discussion highlighted the importance of collaboration and coherence across agencies in responding to intertwined food, climate, and national security crises. Programs like Feed the Future and FEWSNET have decades-long records to draw on, and key lessons have been learned since 2022 in responding to the food crisis provoked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, including a focus on preventing trade restrictions, smoothing access to fertilizers, minimizing food loss/waste, and other inputs. Collaboration between agencies like USAID, the State Department, Treasury, and USDA is essential to preventing and responding to destabilizing food- and climate-driven crises. Defense actors, though not at the forefront of food policies, can contribute by using their strong relationships with foreign governments to reinforce the security benefits of smart food security policies, such as refraining from raising trade barriers during food crises.
- Aligning priorities and breaking silos: More progress can be made in integrating and synchronizing efforts across food, water, and national security, which are often still largely separate. This is sometimes driven by incoherence in legislative frameworks–for example, different legislation governs US efforts on food security (The Global Food Security Act), water security (The Water for the World Act), and political stability (The Global Fragility Act), and all have their own priority countries and criteria. Upcoming reauthorizations and strategy updates under the Global Food Security Act, Water for the World Act, and Global Fragility Act offer opportunities to better synchronize priorities. Participants noted that while food security policies are often justified in terms of national security, there could be more public analysis of the specific ways food impacts US national security (conflict and instability, geopolitical competition, US consumer price shocks, economic competitiveness, etc.).
- Missing (or untapped) foresight capabilities: Gaps exist in foresight capabilities on the intersection of food, climate, and security issues. Some of these gaps relate to technical challenges, such as gaining more granular mapping of soil health or drought impacts, improved climate projections in the 1-10-year timeframe, or analytics around food price spikes and pre-conflict political fragility. However, even in the absence of technical breakthroughs, much progress can be made by making better use of existing data and by cultivating collaborative spaces for interdisciplinary teams to address questions. FEWSNET has a particular humanitarian mission and < 1-year time horizon but offers an established model of informing decision-making and valuable data streams that can be drawn upon for other forecasting efforts or analytic questions.
- Communication and translation: Even more important than foresight and analytic tools is the ability to translate across fields and communicate insights effectively to policymakers. Effective decision support on climate and food security must be policy-relevant, clear, concise, and shareable to be actionable. Workforce development, education, and literacy programs that build fluency between fields like security, earth sciences, economics, and development are critical.
Overall, the discussion emphasized progress and opportunities in collaborating across agencies; synthesizing food, water, and stabilization efforts; and improving the availability and communication of policy-relevant forecasting. Continually advancing these efforts will be critical to safeguarding US and global security from the challenges of climate change and food insecurity.
Panelists and participants included (panelists’ names are bolded):
- Alex Mishko, Department of State
- Alex Naegele, Woodwell Climate Research Center
- Ann Vaughan, USAID
- Apurva Dave, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
- Aurelia Berisha, USDA
- Bob Barnes, Center for Climate and Security
- Brittany Croll, US Institute of Peace
- Caitlin Welsh, Center for Strategic and International Studies
- Christian Man, Nuveen Natural Capital
- Erin Sikorsky, Center for Climate and Security
- Frank Stein, Virginia Tech
- Hilary Landfried, independant Consultant
- Isaac Dietrich, USDA
- Jeff Chase, USAID
- John Conger, Center for Climate and Security
- Justin Hackett, DOD
- Kiersten Johnson, USAID
- Liz Saccoccia, World Resources Institute
- Marcus King, Georgetown University
- Mike Gremillion, University of Alabama Global Water Security Center
- Noah Fritzhand, Center for Climate and Security
- Olivier Ecker, International Food Policy Research Institute
- Patrese Anderson, Department of State
- Sherri Goodman, Council on Strategic Risks/International Military Council on Climate and Security
- Sung Lee, USDA
- Swathi Veeravalli, National Security Council
- Tara Goldberg, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
- Tegan Blaine, US Institute of Peace
- Tom Ellison, Center for Climate and Security