Home » Articles posted by Courtney TIllman (Page 4)
Author Archives: Courtney TIllman
MiRCH Updates, June – October 2025: Militaries Intervene Worldwide During Wildfire and Tropical Cyclone Season
By Tom Ellison and Noah Fritzhand
From June through October 2025, the Military Responses to Climate Hazards (MiRCH) tracker documented 80 military deployments in 25 countries to address climate hazards. Most notably, these five months saw military deployments in response to the devastating impacts of tropical cyclones and torrential rain in transboundary regions across the Indo-Pacific and Caribbean, wildfires across North America and Europe, and severe storms and flooding in the United States. These incidents underscore the implications of preparedness and response cuts in the United States; the challenges of compounding, transnational disasters; and the intersection of disaster relief and conflict.
(more…)Hand in Hand for Better Foods and a Better Future? Taking Stock of Global Food Security after the 2025 World Food Forum
This article was originally published by the Australian Institute of International Affairs. This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.
This year’s World Food Forum focused on partnerships for better foods and a better future, yielding impressive commitments from governments and international organisations to sustainable agriculture, youth-led solutions, and technical innovation. However, several underlying challenges remain, including divisions between the security and food communities, lagging investments, significant infrastructure gaps, and a cadence of multilateral summits that seems disconnected from the challenges on the ground.
In mid-October, over 16,000 participants gathered in Rome for the World Food Forum, an annual flagship event facilitated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to connect government leaders, multilateral organisations, youth organisers, and food systems innovators. Given its explicit focus on youth, science, innovation, and investment, the Forum served as a critical stocktaking moment for areas of opportunity – and challenges ahead in the agri-food space. Supported by record levels of participation, the Forum yielded some critical outputs, including:
- Investment pledges of $17.2 billion, demonstrating a continued interest in and commitment to food security;
- A focus on youth-led solutions and innovation, potentially signaling a shift from top-down HQ-driven policy to more multi-stakeholder or agile models;
- Recognition of the need to break down silos, particularly in addressing the convergence of water, health, and food systems; and
- An elevation of cultural heritage and equity, particularly indigenous methods for preserving biodiversity, farming, and food traditions.
Despite these ambitious commitments, a sobering political and financial reality lies ahead, particularly in light of a more fractured geopolitical and multilateral environment than leaders faced in previous forums. This underlines some critical questions for those working on global food security, many of which remain largely unaddressed in bilateral, regional, and multilateral convenings. These include:
(more…)Feeding Resilience: Recap of CCS and Kansas State Event on Risk and Readiness in Food Security
On October 7, 2025, the Center for Climate and Security (CCS) in partnership with Kansas State University (K-State) hosted a day-long conference as part of CCS’ Feeding Resilience program, a multi-year effort focused on the nexus of climate change, food and agriculture, and global security and stability. Feeding Resilience is deepening its analysis and broadening policy engagement to Europe and multilateral institutions, having previously developed The Feeding Resilience Plan, a set of actionable policy recommendations for the US government, endorsed by 30+ retired generals, admirals, ambassadors, intelligence officials, and former heads of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the World Food Programme (WFP).
Event Summary: Nexus25 2025 UN Climate Week Roundtable
On September 24, 2025, the Nexus25 team convened a private roundtable discussion at this year’s NY Climate Week, focusing on how climate change, food security, and conflict are reshaping human mobility globally. Experts spanning multiple UN agencies, humanitarian organizations, private sector companies, research institutions, and more came together to discuss:
- How national authorities can properly mobilize domestic resources and engage in long-term planning across the climate mobility continuum;
- How policymakers can minimize the impact of divisive rhetoric surrounding migration and human mobility – and galvanize support for anticipatory action that helps people safely move or stay;
- Which upstream interventions are most effective in building partner capacity to handle internal displacement; and
- What new alliances and strategies at the multilateral level are required to manage increased human mobility.
A summary of the Nexus25 side event “Human Mobility At the Nexus of Climate, Food, and Conflict” can be found here.
For more information on the project, please reach out to CCS’ Nexus25 staff (Erin Sikorsky and Siena Cicarelli), or contact the full team at info@nexus25.org.