In 2016 the Food Lab joined an USAID Feed the Future program focusing on private sector engagement in climate-smart agriculture. The program became three linked initiatives (shown below), and to date, the many partners involved have made great strides toward engaging the private sector to act on climate smart agriculture in their supply chains. You…
In a case study produced for the USAID Feed the Future Learning Community for Supply Chain Resilience, the Food Lab features member Ben & Jerry’s and their effort to increase cocoa farmer income while building resilience to climate change. Helping Cocoa Farmers to Achieve A Living Income and Adapt to Climate Change follows the popular ice…
From the creation of the Cool Farm Tool to our work in climate-smart agriculture, much of the Food Lab’s focus has been on building resilience, reducing agricultural GHG emissions, improving soil and above ground carbon sequestration and improving farmer livelihoods. For many of the organizations we work with, reaching and measuring climate targets while making…
Nile Breweries Limited (NBL), Anheuser-Busch InBev’s Ugandan subsidiary, launched its sorghum-based Eagle Lager in 2002. The sorghum-based beer is crafted from local grains predominantly grown by smallholder Ugandan farmers. The Eagle brand exhibited unprecedented success for the company in the Ugandan beer market and that success incentivized NBL to increase their investment in local sourcing…
An Introduction to the Core Tools of System Leadership By: Hal Hamilton and LeAnne Grillo System leadership is one output of the Food Lab and Impact Lab, and it borrows from many colleagues and approaches. After Donella Meadows wrote Limits to Growth from the work of a team, people began thinking of global challenges through the framework…
Since the Food Lab’s beginning 15 years ago, learning journeys have been a core part of our DNA, always accompanying annual summits and sometimes other events too. This year, in lieu of a summit, the Food Lab opted to hold smaller events with more focused conversations. One such event took place in June, a learning journey to…
The USAID Feed the Future Learning Community for Supply Chain Resilience is happy to share the launch of a new website aimed to provide coffee companies with the resources they need to combat climate change. The Climate Smart Coffee website, launched in early May, was created to increase private sector engagement and funding in smallholder…
Looking to ensure that coffee farmers continue to invest in coffee in ways that enable them to grow production and quality in the face of climate change, Olam, a global agribusiness and one of the leading green coffee origin exporters, teamed up with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), investing to improve farmer resilience to…
The cocoa industry has taken bold steps to preventing deforestation in the Cocoa & Forests Initiative (CFI), a public private collaboration between 33 cocoa and chocolate companies (85% of the industry), the governments of Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana, and led by the World Cocoa Foundation and the Sustainable Trade Initiative (IDH). This effort is based…
One of the Sustainable Food Lab’s flagship project, the Cool Farm Tool, is reaching new fields and farms. Since 2008 the Tool’s mission has enabled millions of growers around the world to make more informed on-farm decisions that reduce their environmental impact. Today the Cool Farm Tool is being used by Food Lab and Cool…