Swaminathan Foundation inks pact with UN body on research in agriculture, food security

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed between Bishow Parajuli, WFP India representative and country director, and Madhura Swaminathan, chairperson of MSSRF, on Friday.

The partnership would allow combining the strengths of research, national and global advocacy, grassroots dissemination and policy inputs especially around the aspect of nutrition and resilient livelihoods, said Parajuli.

“WFP and MSSRF are committed to delivering solutions and scalable models to improve food security, especially for the poorest and most vulnerable communities. The increasing and frequent climate crises and shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic have worsened global hunger, threatening food security, nutrition and the livelihoods of millions,” he said.

According to Madhura Swaminathan, the partnership with WFP builds on several organic linkages between the two organisations to leverage research and advocacy, awareness-raising activities, exploring the use of technologies and climate services for the last mile actions for better community resilience and adaptation, undertaking analysis of trends in food and nutrition security, working around issues of nutrition and school feeding and other related areas.

“WFP in India and MSSRF will also develop and implement joint pilot programmes and advocacy for scale-up including potential collaboration for climate vulnerability analysis in select states,” she added.

A release from the foundation said, over the past two decades, the partnership between WFP and MSSRF in India has seen pioneering work on food and nutrition security analysis through the creation of several national level food insecurity atlases, and other policy and research related contributions towards enhanced food security.