Building resilience in agri-food systems in Asia

Our work involves deep engagement with community organisations in Asia to support their work in the following areas: youth and agroecology; the management of sustainable and equitable agri-food systems and; the role of women in agroecological system change. Through our DFAT Australian Award Fellowship Program on sustainable and equitable practice, we are working collaboratively with the Filipino non–government organisation, MASIPAG (Magsasaka at Siyentipiko para sa Pag-unlad ng Agrikultura or Farmer-Scientist Partnership for Development), a network with 30,000 farmers across 63 provinces in the Philippines that works in the area of peasant–led sustainable agriculture. We also work with the Centre for Sustainable Agriculture (CSA) in India which is a professional resource organization engaged in establishing models of sustainable agriculture working in partnership with Indian Indigenous and tribal communities, NGOs and Community-Based Organizations by scaling up the successes and engaging with the establishment for a policy change (for further information please see: https://csa-india.org/about-us/). Over 17 years CSA has worked with 100,000 farmers in communities across India including Adivasi (Indigenous) communities.

Our collaborative works aims to:

1. Support our partners in building farmer networks, food hubs, sustainable agri-food value chains and private sector linkages to better market and distribute local food.
2. Work with our partners on knowledge and knowledge-sharing skills in the following areas: food systems; sustainable agri-food value chains; private sector linkages; gender, food and development; disability-inclusive food systems; food security research, and resilient food alliances and farmer networks.

Outcomes

1. The development of the ‘The Seed Project’ in the Philippines which is a pilot action research project that aims to empower young people to create and scale up community-based social enterprises that promote organic, farmer-led agricultural development in Asia
2. At the request of the community organisations involved in the DFAT program, our collaboration led to a co-authored book entitled ‘Listening to People, Listening to Place: A climate change guide for organisers and communities’. This is a key resource that community groups are using in their work on climate change
3. A 3-day ‘International Congress on Youth for Agroecology’ (IYC) organised by the MASIPAG in Los Negros in the Philippines in September 2019, involving organisations from the Philippines, India and Vietnam. This project was funded by the Monash Business School Seed funding scheme
4. A very rich exchange and international knowledge transfer between the organisations from Asia. For example, our participants from Caritas (Vietnam) have initiated trials for new marketing and promotional techniques in the Vietnamese context, based on the private sector knowledge and experience of the MASIPAG network in the Philippines.

Monash researchers