Welcome to the TASK FORCE ON GLOBAL FOOD SECURITY

You are invited to explore what the Task Force (TF) does, its origins, its membership, and its plans for the future. Please read on and follow the links:

The challenge

A public meeting at the 1998 International Congress of Plant Pathology in Edinburgh set the scene for discussion of Plant Pathology and Global Food Security. Nobel Peace Laureate Dr Norman Borlaug challenged ISPP to take action on food security, recognizing the enormity of the problem and the significant contribution to it made by the control of plant diseases.

ISPP’s response

ISPP’s response to Borlaug’s challenge was to establish a Task Force on Global Food Security. The Task Force, led by Dr Peter Scott and comprised of plant pathologists from diverse backgrounds, convened in Bangkok in 1999. They decided to focus their efforts on what ISPP could do to deliver tangible results with limited resources: see their Report which proposed five Activities.

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FIVE ACTIVITIES OF THE TASK FORCE: EARLY EXAMPLES, 1999-2005

1. Changing Public Policy and Opinions on Global Food Security

Among policy makers, the public, and even farmers there is often only limited awareness of the role of plant disease in food security. The TF seeks opportunities to correct this. An early example occurred at the First Asian Conference on Plant Pathology (ACPP 2000) in Beijing, where the TF made a presentation on Biotechnology in food security and environmental protection, and convened a Media Workshop for journalists from India, Malaysia, and China. A statement endorsing agricultural biotechnology was endorsed by many participants.

Among other early initiatives designed to broaden awareness of plant diseases, the TF prepared a submission to the World Food Summit in Rome, 2002.

2. Enhanced PhD training for plant pathology in developing countries

A questionnaire study of postgraduate training for plant pathology in developing countries was conducted by Dr Richard Strange. It confirmed that declining funds in developed countries underlie the declining availability of training - especially for students from developing countries. It was suggested that a condition of an award should be that a student from developing countries should work in his or her home country for at least 3 years after training in a developed country.

3. Quantification of the economic impact of some major diseases

As an initial step towards this challenging goal, a review was prepared by Dr Richard Strange and Dr Peter Scott on ‘Plant disease: a threat to global food security’, published in Annual Review of Phytopathology 53, 83-116 (2005). It was concluded that catastrophic plant diseases significantly exacerbate the current deficit of food supply. At the political level the need is for plant diseases to be acknowledged as a threat to food supplies and, in consequence, that there is a need for adequate resources to be devoted to their control.

4. Farmer training in simple disease management: pilot project  

A competitive Challenge Programme in 2003 called for project proposals to enable plant pathology to contribute to the challenge of global food security. ISPP supported a project at the Crops Research Institute, Kumasi, Ghana, led by Dr Emmanuel Moses. The purpose was to develop appropriate strategies to control cassava diseases in Ghana, with an emphasis on training a group of farmers to understand that disease limits their production, and then to recognize and manage the diseases that affected their crops. This aim was achieved, and the project delivered an illustrated booklet, “Guide to Identification and Control of Cassava Diseases”, with descriptions of all the major diseases of cassava that reduce yield in most parts of Sub-Saharan Africa.

5. Development of the ISPP Website

The website is being populated with a developing body of information about: ISPP, plant pathology, why it is important, and what needs to be done about it – including the activities of the ISPP Task Force on Global Food Security. 

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SOME KEY INITIATIVES OF THE TASK FORCE, 2006-2013

Challenge Programme

Activity 4 (above) had been selected in a competitive Challenge Programme, which invited proposals that would enable plant pathology to contribute to the challenge of global food security. ISPP committed USD 50,000 over 3 years to support the programme. The project to train farmers in Ghana was chosen from among five proposals.

Recognizing the value of the Challenge Programme, ISPP committed a further USD 50,000 over 3 years to a 2007 Challenge. From many proposals from 15 countries, a project led by Professor Lise Korsten of the University of Pretoria was selected, addressing Changing Public Perceptions and Opinions on Global Food Security. Its aims included establishment of a Food Security Information Hub to create awareness of the importance of plant diseases in food security. For example, a vehicle was converted into a Plant Pathology Science Information and Demonstrative Laboratory, which travelled between schools and science festivals in southern Africa to raise public awareness of food security issues. The project delivered a Report and a Video.

The Challenge Programme has, in two specific contexts, delivered benefits to food security through raising awareness of plant diseases and capacity to respond to them. The TF proposes to develop the Programme further, recognizing that new funding must first be available.

A new international journal: Food Security

In 2007, on behalf of ISPP, TF members Richard Strange and Peter Scott progressed the project to develop a new journal, guided by an international Advisory Board of scientists, sociologists and economists who hold a deep concern for the challenge of global food security, together with a vision of the power of shared knowledge as a means of addressing that challenge.

Of six approaches to publishers made by the Advisory Board, the one most positively received was to Springer. A Publishing Agreement between ISPP and Springer was signed in 2008:

• A new peer-reviewed journal, Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, would be launched in 2009, in print and online.
• Ownership of this official journal of ISPP (responsible for content and editorial matters) is equally shared with Springer (responsible for publishing, bearing all costs, paying royalties to ISPP).  After 15 years, ISPP has the right to acquire full ownership.
• Online access is normally free in developing countries and substantially discounted to individual ISPP Members. There are no page charges to authors.

The aims and scope of Food Security extend beyond plant pathology, beyond plants, and beyond agriculture, to address the constraints - physical, biological and socio-economic - which limit food production and access to a healthy diet. It takes an overview of food security, with a broad perspective over its many component disciplines.

The journal has been published, first quarterly and then every 2 months, since 2009, with editorial control exercised for ISPP by an Editor-in-Chief and an Editorial Board. Around 60 papers are accepted for publication each year (the number is increasing), from more than twice this number of scripts submitted. The journal has a substantial and improving Impact Factor, currently above 2.0. The journal flyer is available.

The Editor-in-Chief publishes Alerts for Policy Makers each year, based on the papers published. These are illustrative of the potential influence of the journal in its aim to address the constraints that limit global food security.

ICPP Congress sessions on plant pathology and food security

The TF has organized sessions on plant pathology and food security at the International Congresses of Plant Pathology in Christchurch (2003), Torino (2008) and Beijing (2013), in collaboration with the national Organizing Committees. Plans are in hand for the Congress in Boston (2018).

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PLANNING FOR 2014 AND BEYOND

At their 2013 meeting TF members proposed that the five “Activities” need to be refreshed, as part of a review of the future vision and aims of the TF, to be undertaken with ISPP Executive Committee.

Membership of the TF is informal and open to anyone willing to cooperate in furthering its aims. A list of current members is published. Meetings of the TF are mostly informal, by email or Skype; round-table meetings are arranged as opportunities arise.

All those with an interest in plant disease as a constraint to global food security are warmly invited to submit suggestions for the future of the TF to the Chair, Professor Lise Korsten, University of Pretoria, indicating whether they also wish to be invited to become TF members.

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