USDA report warns climate change likely to impede progress on global food security

PARIS, Dec. 2, 2015 — Climate change is likely to impede progress on reducing undernourishment around the world in the decades ahead, according to a major scientific assessment released today by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on global food security and its implications for the United States. The report, entitled Climate Change, Global Food Security and the U.S. Food System, identifies the risks that climate change poses to global food security and the challenges facing farmers and consumers in adapting to changing climate conditions. Secretary Vilsack released the report during the COP-21 Paris Climate Conference.

Earth has lost a third of arable land in past 40 years, scientists say. Experts point to damage caused by erosion and pollution, raising major concerns about degraded soil amid surging global demand for food.

The world has lost a third of its arable land due to erosion or pollution in the past 40 years, with potentially disastrous consequences as global demand for food soars, scientists have warned.

Senate confirms Gayle E. Smith as head of USAID

WASHINGTON — The Senate on Monday voted to confirm Gayle E. Smith, a former national security aide to President Obama, to lead the United States Agency for International Development, the federal agency responsible for overseas humanitarian issues like feeding refugees, building clinics and distributing foreign aid.

South Sudan food team finds risk of ‘widespread catastrophe’

South Sudan was plunged into a civil war in December 2013 when a political crisis triggered fighting between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir and rebels allied with his former deputy Riek Machar. The conflict has reopened ethnic faultlines that pit Kiir’s Dinka people against Machar’s ethnic Nuer people.

Bread for the World puts price tag on hunger in the United States: $160 billion in health care

WASHINGTON (RNS) Hunger and food insecurity are so widespread in the United States they add $160 billion to national health care spending, according to a Christian advocacy group.The Rev. David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, said on Monday (Nov. 23) that hunger was a key factor in the U.S. having the worst infant mortality rate among developed countries.