Author: mapg0002

This blog post is written by Einar Nordgren, Vice Chair of the Joint Committee of Student Unions of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU).

Drinking my morning coffee on the terrace of the headquarters of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nation’s (FAO). Photo: Jens Mårtensson

It was with an ounce of confusion that I stepped into the FAO headquarters in Rome at the start of the World Food Forum, what will happen, is there anyone here that I know and what will I be able to contribute?

One of these questions was cleared up quite quickly when I entered the entrance and met representatives from SLU and Alnarp Agroecology Farm, but the other questions were still unsolved.

During the various sessions organised, I came to the realisation quite quickly that I could contribute and bring home thoughts and reflections. Much of what was discussed was linked to the involvement of young people in decision-making. Something that I, in my role as Vice President of Sluss (The Joint Committee of Student Unions of SLU), work with daily and that I also realised that in Sweden we are good at involving young people in decision-making.

A session on the opportunities and challenges of agriculture and forestry from the perspective of young people.
Photo: Einar Nordgren

But I also came to another realisation, and that is that the word sustainability has different meanings depending on where in the world we are. When I think about sustainable food production from a Swedish perspective, it’s about being economical, reducing climate impact through emissions and economising on the resources we have. I looked at the Swedish Board of Agriculture’s website to see how they have defined sustainability and in summary, their definition is about economic and environmental sustainability, but also social sustainability to fulfil human rights. During the World Food Forum, sustainable food production was discussed from a completely different perspective, namely ensuring the long-term ability to put nutritious food on the table.

The fact that sustainable food production can be defined in two such different ways was something I hadn’t realised before, but is very important to keep in mind.

Having the opportunity to participate in events like these is a privilege and something that should not be taken for granted. Students from all over the world participated in the World Food Forum, but there was one thing that separated the two groups. Namely, the conditions to participate, both when it came to getting a visa to travel to Rome, but also the financial aspect. While the majority of the students had received financial support to participate, the common factor for those who had paid for their own participation was that these were people who came from countries that do not have a stable and secure food supply.

As I sat down and listened to the different speakers and had a look around the room on the first day, I realised how big the world is!

The conference hall at the FAO headquarters. Photo: Einar Nordgren

But a few days later it turns out that it may not be as big as I think. During my second year as a student at SLU, I went on a study trip to Slovenia to see how their forestry works and I had the opportunity to meet and talk to the forestry students there. In a corridor at FAO in Rome I met one of these students again. I have heard the saying ‘The forest is not as big as you think’ during my education, but I never thought when I stepped into the World Food Forum that I would say the world is not as big as you think.

Back at campus Ultuna, I will now try to summarise a couple of extremely interesting and instructive days in Rome. Linking back to the title of this blog post, I have realised how big the world is when one word can mean so many different things, but at the same time so small, especially when you have decided which direction to take, both professionally and academically.

With regards from Einar

 

About the World Food Forum

The World Food Forum (WFF) was launched in 2021 by the Youth Committee of the the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), as an independent network of partners. Hosted within FAO, it serves as the premier global platform to actively shape agrifood systems for a better food future, accelerating the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Through youth action, science and innovation, and investment, the WFF forges new paths of action and multi-sector partnerships for agrifood impact at the local, regional and global levels to achieve a more sustainable, resilient, inclusive and hunger-free food future for all.

This blog post is written by Mary Theodorah Ajal, Master’s student at SLU.

From left: Peter Wallensteen, Mary Theodorah Ajal, Jan Egeland, Reina Lee, Linnea Törnlund and Janithrika Jayasundara. Photo: Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation

On 16 September 2024, I had the honor of representing the Swedish University of Agricultural Science as one of the panelists during the Dag Hammarskjöld annual lecture, organised by the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation.

Before the invitation to participate as one of the panelists, I did not know who Dag Hammarskjöld was nor anything about Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation. Luckily, I was brought to speed with different materials and information about Dag Hammarskjöld and the previous Dag Hammarskjöld annual lectures. I must say I was so overwhelmed when I learned about the high-profile individuals, who in the previous year’s gave lectures, and the speakers I would be meeting. I am grateful for the guidance offered by Prof. Peter Wallensteen; it did calm me down to give my best.

Dag Hammarskjöld served as the UN Secretary-General from 1953 till his death in 1961. He lost his life in the pursuit of peace, on a mission to mediate the Congo crisis in the 1960s. I am humbled to have participated in an event that celebrates and honors the life and service of Dag Hammarskjöld.

I had the honor of sharing the stage with several distinguished guests including Rena Lee, Ambassador for International Law and Chief Executive of the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore, Secretary General for the Norwegian Refugee Council, Jan Egeland, Prof. Peter Wallensteen, Senior Professor of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University, and my fellow panelists Janithrika Jayasundara, Pax et Bellum and Linnea Törnlund, the Vice President Uppsala Association of Foreign Affairs.

I was privileged to meet the Vice Chancellor of Uppsala University, Professor Anders Hagfeldt, Chairperson Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation Board of Trustees, Hans Wallmark, and many other distinguished guests.

In one sentence the event was surreal.

I learned from Secretary General Jan Egeland that peace can’t be pursued passively. Conflict resolution isn’t possible with hypocrisy or selective application of laws.

Despite all, there’s hope as long as there is someone making the bold steps to restore peace. As long as there is someone speaking up and acting on it, there is hope for peace.

Ambassador Rena Lee is a woman crowned in grace, wisdom, and humility. She’s a testament that anything is possible. As a young woman looking forward to making the world a better place, she fueled my will and zeal.

I had the great opportunity to ask her questions about

the Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ Agreement) or “High Seas Treaty” in the areas of deep-sea exploration and plastic management in the oceans.

I thank SLU for the opportunity to participate in the Dag Hammarskjöld annual lecture. I am also privileged to receive funding from SLU Global through the Minor Field Study (MFS) grant to facilitate my master’s thesis research abroad in the Karamoja region, North Eastern Uganda. My study will focus on the Characterization and productivity of kitchen gardens and their contribution to food security and livelihoods in the Karamoja region. I am excited about my research because it will be able to inform policy and shape how kitchen gardens can be implemented in agropastoral and pastoral regions to enhance food security and livelihoods.

Kitchen gardens in Moroto, North Eastern Uganda, where I am doing my research for my Masters thesis.
Photos: Mary Theodorah Ajal

I am eager to gain an understanding of kitchen gardens in an agropastoral and pastoral region. “Is it the same as my understanding of kitchen gardens in Sweden, or in my small hometown in Tororo, Eastern Uganda or is it something new and beautifully different?”

About my future plans, I am looking forward to pursuing a PhD when an opportunity opens but I am also open to working with organizations that are supporting local/indigenous food systems to become more sustainable and resilient.

To learn about Dag Hammarskjöld visit: https://www.daghammarskjold.se/

Watch the recording of the Dag Hammarskjöld lecture 2024 here: https://www.daghammarskjold.se/dag-hammarskjold-lecture/the-dag-hammarskjold-lecture-2023-2024/

Yours truly, Mary Theodorah

This blog post is written by Katarina Börling, research adviser at SLU Global, in conjunction to the International Year of Millets 2023.

Sowing millets in the village of Samadey in 1995 ­– a collaborative process. One person created a pocket (hole), while another carefully placed 10-15 seeds into each pocket. After a few weeks, a thinning process took place, and only the three healthiest plants were retained. Photo: Katarina Börling

My first encounter with millets was in the 1990s, spending numerous hot hours in a pearl millets field in the village Samadey outside Niamey in Niger. This was part of a Minor Field Study linked to the PhD thesis of Johan Rockström, where he annually brought two SLU students. The fieldwork gave a good opportunity to follow the cultivation of millets on a farmer’s field. The daily routine also included a morning stop on our way out of Niamey, to buy “maza” – small millets pancakes, from a woman cooking them on a roadside wood stove, which served as our field lunch.

Purchase of lunch – millets pancakes – before leaving Niamey for a day of fieldwork. Photo: Katarina Börling

As one of the earliest domesticated crops with a history dating back 7 000 years, millets have been a staple crop in many parts of the world. However, in the past half-century, millets have been replaced in many regions, in favor of higher-yielding crops such as maize, rice and wheat. Yet, there is a rising interest in millets as they are resilient crops with low input requirements and an ability to cope with increasing effects of climate change, such as drought and flooding. In addition, the interest is driven by the health benefits and nutritional value of millets, providing gluten free grains rich in minerals, vitamins and antioxidants.

Here I’m measuring soil water content in the millet field during the sowing period, protecting the instrument from the hot sun with a shirt. Photo: Kristina Gullbrandsson

SLU symposium dedicated to millets

In India, the spotlight on millets was set a few of years ago, when declaring 2018 as the National Year of Millets. Building on this, the Government of India also proposed to the United Nations General Assembly to declare 2023 the International Year of Millets (IYM 2023). Throughout the year, information has been gathered and several events have been organised to inspire stakeholders from policymakers to farmers, civil society and researchers, promoting a reassessment of the crucial role that millets play both in diets and in production.

In contribution to IYM 2023, we at SLU Global together with SLU Plant Protection Network and SLU Breeding Network, organised a symposium dedicated to millets in September 2023 in Alnarp.The event brought together SLU researchers and MSc students, as well as several international participants. Keynote speaker was Patrick Okori, the Executive Secretary of the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM), who gave an inspiring talk where he framed the role of different millet crops in a changing climate and how it can be used for diverse purposes, including as a healthy food alternative. However, he pointed out the need for further research and development on millets.

At the symposium, we discovered that the typical millet yield in Africa is as low as one ton per hectare. However, it was underscored that there is an unleashed yield potential of millets, which can be unlocked through improved breeding materials, optimized agricultural practices and improved seed systems. Concerning health benefits, several positive effects of millets consumption was raised, and we also learned that millets can be used for making nutritious porridge for undernourished children.

I was also very inspired by invited speaker Alexandra Klang from Svalorna (LINK) who talked about the Millets sisters in India. A group of Dalit women who are leading a change of norms in India by supporting small scale millets farmers, pushing politicians to introduce millets in schools, working with seed banks and improving market for millets. By sharing knowledge nationwide, they have elevated the millet cultivation, promoting indigenous knowledge and through that, provided food sovereignty.

Several of the speakers addressed the concern of vanishing cooking traditions, highlighting that millets pose a challenge in terms of preparation due to their unique demands in the kitchen. Also, some new millets varieties give a high yield, but doesn’t taste well, which emphasizes the delicate balance needed between cultivation benefits and gastronomic appeal in millets breeding. However, for us, the day at the millet symposium was nicely framed as we were served tasty millets-cookies for “fika” and a nice millet lunch, which made the day a holistic experience.

Johan Rockström and my fellow SLU student, Kristina Gullbrandsson, taking a break in the shadow during the fieldwork. The millet plants are growing bigger every week. Photo: Katarina Börling

Looking at the bright future for millets

During the week when I wrote this blog post, my excitement for millets reached new heights as I tuned into a news programme on national Swedish TV. Among the often discouraging news reports, a ray of positivity emerged when I witnessed the Indian farmer, Pradeep, passionately talking about his own experience of millets, and how millets can address the issue of food security. “More people’s hunger can be satisfied if more people eat millets, there is no doubt about it”. The journalist behind the feature, Malin Mendel, is a well-known Swedish international correspondent that has a taste for Indian cuisine and has written several cookbooks on the subject. When Malin tasted the millet pancakes that the farmer and his wife had cooked, she said with satisfaction “It tastes healthy!”, maybe implying that millets will become the new fashionable, healthy food making a comeback in the urban areas of India.

With increasing impacts of climate change that calls for resilient crops, coupled with an increasing demand for nutritious and healthy foods, I feel hopeful that the IYM 2023 will increase the interest in millets and that millets are ready for comeback.

The people in Samadey passing through the millets field at the end of the season before harvest of the millets. Photo: Katarina Börling

Find out more about SLU’s research and activities on millets and other traditional crops on SLU Global’s web here.