Summary: Briefing by Ms. Beth Bechdol, Deputy Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), on Maintenance of International Peace and Security: Climate, Food Security and Conflict, during the Security Council, 9547th meeting.
Ms. Bechdol: I too would like to start by thanking the President of Guyana for convening this meeting and inviting the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to speak.
Climate and conflict are the most important issues with regard to urgent action to address global food insecurity. The scientific evidence and the policy direction are clear. Climate change is compromising food security, and its impacts are a growing threat to international peace and security. It is having an alarming effect on people and the planet, as well as on what I would like to address this morning, which is agrifood systems — meaning how and when we produce, harvest, process and store our food. Increasing temperatures, changing precipitation patterns and more frequent climate extremes are already a reality and are becoming more intense. The climate crisis spares no one, but it does not affect everyone equally or in the same way. We know that the populations at greatest risk are those that depend on agriculture and natural resources. They live in rural areas, and they are farmers themselves. Their livelihoods are highly exposed and vulnerable to climate change impacts, which limits their capacity to respond and makes them prone to disputes arising from any scarcity of those natural resources.
Strong viable livelihoods are central to mitigating those climate-related security risks. When they are threatened, an important pathway is created for how climate change can contribute to the risk of conflict. We at FAO, as a specialized technical agency of the United Nations system focused specifically on food and agriculture, increasingly find ourselves in that very space. We have heard it said many times — there is no food security without peace, and no peace without food security. But now, more and more, we are dealing with the impacts of climate change. We have seen first-hand how conflict leads to hunger and malnutrition, and it is no coincidence that half of the world’s hungry people live in conflict-affected zones. According to the 2023 Global Report on Food Crises, the main drivers of food insecurity and hunger around the world are conflict and climate change, with 258 million people in 58 countries facing high levels of acute food insecurity — Integrated Phase Classification 3 or greater. And more than two thirds of them, or 174 million people, are at that level because of climate and conflict. While there may not be a direct causality between the two, there is clear evidence that climate change increases risks and drivers of conflict and instability such as disputes over land and water, and that conflict contributes to vulnerability to climate change, especially for people who are forced to leave their homes and migrate. As many as 70 per cent of the most climate-vulnerable countries are also among the most politically and economically fragile.
Climate change will undo the progress that has been made in alleviating hunger, and as it intensifies, it will create further disruptions and continue to be a driver of conflict. It is projected that 10 per cent of the world’s area currently suitable for major crops and livestock could be climatically unsuitable by mid-century, in high-emission scenarios. That is a further reduction of an already limited area that we depend on to produce our food. That scenario concerns all farmers, including small farmers, pastoralists, foresters and fisher folk, who bear the brunt of climate impacts, owing to their dependence on natural resources, soil, water and land. I see that on my own family’s farm in the United States Midwest, and I see it first-hand in places such as Afghanistan, Kenya, Somalia, Uganda and elsewhere.
Conflict affects the ability of communities to produce and access food. It reduces agricultural yields and productivity. It displaces farmers from their lands. It destroys agricultural assets, disrupts markets and services, increases prices and even introduces new risks for human health. We have to equip farmers and communities to prepare for and respond to such crises and recover quickly from them. We have to help them build resilience. We are actually seeing the results of such efforts in a place like Afghanistan, where we are starting to see a significant decrease in the number of people facing acute food insecurity. We know those approaches can work; we just need to scale them up. The Secretary-General’s Peacebuilding Fund has been responding effectively to the need to address the intersection of climate change and conflict and the effects of heightened competition over natural resources. It works. FAO remains committed to supporting those types of projects and to strengthening collaboration with partners.
Let me share just a few examples illustrating the complex, context-specific and multidimensional relationship between climate change and conflict.
In West and Central Africa, cross-border transhumance is a long-standing traditional pastoral practice. It is when herders migrate seasonally, crossing borders with their livestock in search of water and pasture. Historically, it has been peaceful, but climate change and environmental and security pressures have altered those migratory routes. That has led to a steady increase in tensions within agriculture between farming and herding communities, often linked to growing competition for already-scarce natural resources, such as water and land, or to damage incurred to crops in the fields. This problem exists in Burkina Faso, in Mali and the Niger, where FAO and the International Organization for Migration are working together to reduce violent conflicts linked to transhumance through an alert system and mechanisms for conflict management.
That is just a glimpse of our work with herders and pastoralists. But as we know, climate change and conflict affect all agricultural sectors, not just livestock. It affects crop production, fisheries and forestry, which are intimately and inextricably linked to climate change, and it creates additional pressures on accessing natural resources.
In Yemen, FAO has implemented a water-for-peace project, which has helped to mitigate water-based conflicts, with women often working as the conflict resolution agents. The project, which functions through a cash-for-work incentive, focuses on rehabilitating irrigation canals for participating communities in protected areas where water flows during rainfall. It prioritizes engagement among farming communities under the project to resolve local conflicts over upstream and downstream water allocation.
Climate change, and the security risks it presents, knows no geographical boundaries. Cooperation is therefore needed at all levels to ensure the peaceful and sustainable management of shared resources.
Let me conclude by recommending five actions to take in order to continue advancing this agenda.
First, we need to prioritize investments. We need to build climate-resilient agrifood systems and local approaches that help build and sustain peace, drawing on climate-change adaptation, disaster-risk reduction and community-based approaches.
Secondly, we need to request United Nations entities to regularly analyse and report on the risks and links associated with climate change. Data and information are key for targeted interventions.
Thirdly, we need to improve strategic coordination at all levels and leverage existing mechanisms, such as the United Nations Climate Security Mechanism and the Climate Security Coordination Mechanism of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development.
Fourthly, we need to source specialized climate peace and security adviser roles in more United Nations missions, especially those susceptible to climate change.
Lastly, we need to establish regional climate peace and security hubs, as was done by the Office of the Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa.
Let me conclude by simply saying that we cannot neglect agriculture as a key solution to the growing threats from climate change and conflict and their effects on food security. It is time for us to focus on farmers, pastoralists, fisherfolk and foresters — the people who feed the world. We cannot afford to leave them behind.
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