Food Security and Climate-Smart Food Systems

The resilience of food systems and security to emerging challenges and threats, especially in the context of environmental and climate risks and global pandemics such as the Covid-19 crisis, is currently gaining growing importance in research, policy, and practice. Based on this, the core focus of this book, as a part of a series of CERES publications, consists of identifiying and exploring the best ways to overcome such challenges and shocks and to build resilience in the Global South. More precisely, the book analyzes current dynamics and trends related to the climate resilience of food security and assess the relevance of emerging approaches such as climate-smart agriculture, new roles of agriculture extension, smart farming, and climate adaptation of farming systems.The book includes both conceptual and empirical research reporting lessons learned from many geographical, environmental, social, and policy settings while focusing on Africa, Middle East, and Asia. It also provides research and policy-oriented inputs and recommendations to guide change processes at multiple scales.

Behnassi, Mohamed
Dr. Behnassi is a Professor at the College of Law, Economics, and Social Sciences of Agadir, Ibn Zohr University, Morocco. He is a SeniorResearcher of international law and politics of environment and humansecurity. He holds a PhD in International Environmental Law and Governance (Hassan II University of Casablanca, 2003) and a Diploma inInternational Environmental Law and Diplomacy (University of EasternFinland and UNEP, 2015). He is currently the Founding Director of the Center for Environment, Human Security and Governance (CERES) –Former North-South Center for Social Sciences (NRCS). From 2015 to 2018, he was theDirector of the Research Laboratory for Territorial Governance, Human Security and Sustainability (LAGOS) in the same university. Recently, he was appointed as Expert Evaluator for the National Center for Scientific and Technical Research (CNRST/Morocco),and selected as Expert by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity andEcosystem Services (IPBES) and the Mediterranean Experts on Climate and Environmental Change (MEDECC) to take part in global and regional assessments, respectively. Accordingly,he was among the Lead Authors of the 1st Assessment Report (MAR1): Climate and Environmental Change in the Mediterranean Basin - Current Situation and Risks for the Future (MEDECC, 2021). Dr. Behnassi has published considerable number of scientific papers and book chapters in addition to 17 books, including recent ones on: Social-Ecological Systems in the Era of Risks and Insecurity - Pathways to Viability and Resilience (Springer International Publishing, 2021); and Building Resilience for Food and Water Security Face to Climate Change and Biodiversity Decline - Perspectives from Asia, Middle-East and Africa (Springer International Publishing, 2021); Human and Environmental Security in the Era of Global Risks (Springer International Publishing, 2019). He organized as well many international conferences covering the above research areas and managed many research and expertise projects on behalf of various national and international organizations. Dr. Behnassi is regularly requested to provide scientific expertise nationally and internationally. Other professional activities include social compliance auditing and consultancy by monitoring human rights at work and the sustainability of the global supply chain.


Baig, Mirza Barjees
Dr. Baig is a Professor at the Prince Sultan Institute for Environmental,Water and Desert Research, King Saud University, Saudi Arabia. Heearned his MS degree in International Agricultural Extension in 1992 from the Utah State University, Logan, Utah, USA and was placed on the “Roll of Honor”. He completed his Ph.D. in Extension for Natural ResourceManagement from the University of Idaho, USA and was honored with the“1995 outstanding graduate student award”. Dr. Baig has published extensively onthe issues associated with natural resources in national andinternational journals. He has also presented issues in agriculture and natural resources and the role of extension education at various international conferences. Food waste, watermanagement, degradation of environment and natural resources, and their relationship withsociety/community are his areas of interest. He has attempted to develop strategies to conservenatural resources, promote environment, and develop sustainable communities. Dr. Baig started his scientific career in 1983 as a researcher at the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council, Islamabad, Pakistan. He served at the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada as the Special Graduate Faculty from 2000-2005. He served as a Foreign Professor at the Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU), Pakistan through Higher Education Commission from 2005-2009. He also served as a Professor of Agricultural Extension and Rural Society at the King Saud University, Saudi Arabia from 2009-2020. He is a member of editorial boards of many international journals and professional organizations.


Sraïri, Mohamed Taher
Dr. Sraïri is a Senior Lecturer in Animal Science at the Hassan II Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine Institute (IAV), Rabat, Morocco. He is currently the Head of the School of Agricultural Sciences at IAV. Dr.Sraïri completed his Ph.D in 2004 from the Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech University, Belgium. He has an experience of 26 years in research on topics related to crop-livestock systems in Morocco with a focus on dairy production. His research activities have allowed him to publish more than 60 peer-reviewed articles in international journals, as well as the participation in several conferences dedicated to livestock and agricultural sciences. He has also been associated to reviewing several manuscripts submitted to international scientific journals. He is mainly interested in crop-livestock integration, with an emphasis on resources use efficiency, particularly land, water, and work. As a consequence, he had achieved on-farm research in semi-arid to arid areas on water productivity in crop-livestock systems, in contexts where farms are in majority smallholder units, with a focus on the origin
of water (whether rainfall or irrigation from surface or groundwater sources). This has necessitated an accurate characterization of the resources uses (volumes of water and hours of work) and the yields and profitability they allowed by crops and livestock products. He is currently involved in a global research network dealing with work uses in farming systems andtheir consequences on the attractiveness of agriculture, particularly for young generations. He is also involved in research activities with a transdisciplinary team in the oases areas, where global changes (climate, social, etc.) are severely impacting farming systems, putting at risk their resilience, in a context of severe resource scarcity.


Al-Sheikh, Abdul-Malik Bin Abdul-Rahman
Dr. Al-Alsheikh is the Director of the Prince Sultan Institute for Environmental, Water, and Desert Research at the King Saud University (KSU) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He earned his Ph.D. in Arid Land Studies from the University of Arizona, USA in 1983. He also serves as the General Secretary of the Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz International Prize for Water (PSIPW). The Prize is awarded bi-annually at the United Nations Headquarters. Being the Director and Research Chair, he oversees the Research Programs at the Institute. He is the team leader of many research projects concerning the environment, desertification, climate change, and water harvesting in Saudi Arabia including the King Fahd Project for Water Harvesting and Storage in Saudi Arabia, Prince Sultan Project for Villages and Hamlets Rehabilitation in Saudi Arabia, the Space Images Atlas of Saudi Arabia and the Environmental Atlas of Saudi Arabia. Being the Chairman of the international conferences on water resources and arid environments, he successfully organized them at the King Saud University. He has brought world fame water scientists to Saudi Arabia and published 9 proceedings of organized international conferences.He has published extensively in journals of international repute.


Abu-Risheh, Ali Wafa
Eng. Abu-Risheh earned his M.Sc Degree in Applied Remote Sensing from Cranfield University in the UK in 1987. He is the Head of the Department of Remote Sensing and GIS at the Prince Sultan Institute for Environmental, Water, and Desert Research at King Saud University in Riyadh. He is also the Executive Director of the Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz International Prize for Water, and a Researcher for the Prize’s dedicated research chair at KSU. He has overseen a number of projects involving remote sensing, including the Space Image Atlas of Saudi Arabia, the King Fahd Project for Water Harvesting and Storage in Saudi Arabia, and recently the Atlases of the Environmental Systems and the Sustainable Development of Saudi Arabia.