Background
All kind of global production and management systems face increasing pressure system overload, that these systems are not able to buffer against. The challenge is to increase the robustness of our systems, making them more resilient to shocks and crises. Achieving this requires insight in the operation of systems and in the impact of individual interventions on the whole, in order to better manage supplies and resources that are essential for the functioning of societies worldwide.

Issues and Challenges
Agriculture and food security are under pressure worldwide and are influenced by the crises in food, climate and credit, which again affect each other. The focus of our policy objective is to increase the systems’ resilience: socio-economic, ecological, agricultural and veterinary. In other words, what is required is an integrated multidisciplinary approach to agriculture, biodiversity, water and economy. This approach should be better suited to the complexity of the issues than the previous sector approach and must provide more scope for transition and innovation of agriculture and food systems at global level. In its strategic agenda, the Ministry recognizes the importance of knowledge for the problems of society’s development. Central to the research on this theme is risk analysis, with risk-assessment, risk management and risk communication as sub-elements. How can we improve the resilience of our agricultural, nature and economic systems under the increasing threat from economic and social turmoil and environmental degradation? What are the conditions for ensuring that sustainability is both achievable and affordable? Trade interests as well as food supply and human and animal health (zoonosis) are at stake here. This knowledge must contribute to the realization of international agreements like those under the Commission on Sustainable Development, the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), and the Millennium Development Goals.

This theme is divided in the following four thematic priorities:

• Economic risk management
  Market stabilization is a pre-condition for preventing crises on the food market, like those we have recently seen and which are expected to recur before too long. Policy research is extremely relevant in the light of the Minister’s chairmanship of the Commission on Sustainable Development in 2009 and activities in the framework of the LNV-OS policy brief.
  • Objective – To develop a comprehensive risk management framework for the food market.
  • Approach - To compare and connect various existing agricultural risk management instruments into a comprehensive framework for addressing a wide range of economic risks. This project will establish a link with work in the OECD in Paris.
    

• Animal health
  Animal diseases increasingly pose a threat to human and animal health due to globalization of trade and climate change. Increased vigilance is needed to counter BO Cluster International Work plan 2010 17 this. Biophysical and institutional conditions increase the risk for developing countries to become sources of epidemics. This includes increased threats from both vector born pathogens that spread farther due to climate change and product-born pathogens spread through trade. The latter links to the next theme, food safety.
  • Objectives – To identify mechanisms to reduce the risks of animal disease development at the source; to build capacities of institutions responsible for prevention and control; to improve mechanisms in the Netherlands to deal with threats here.
  • Approach - A crosscutting risk assessment for vector born diseases is added to already
    ongoing disease specific prevention and control initiatives in research and capacity development with partners, notably in South Africa and Indonesia.
    

• Food safety
  Governance of food safety has a direct effect on food security for both sides of international trade relationships – in exporting countries in terms of stability of livelihood security for producers and other value chain actors, in (European) importing countries in terms of consistent supply of safe food.
  • Objectives – To create a stable basis for international trade in agricultural products; to provide opportunities for smallholders to gain access to the European market, both through ensuring feasible food safety systems.
  • Approach – For a number of commodities solutions will be developed to arrive at production of safe products within minimum ecological and economic impacts. Through capacity building of food safety inspection authorities and further development of institutions, inspection mechanisms are enhanced, to ensure that traded products indeed are safe. Several of these activities are continuations of earlier work, notably in Indonesia.
    

• Climate adaptation strategy, agriculture and food production
  While working hard at climate change mitigation, adaptation measures become increasingly urgent. Increased food production from a declining resource base necessitates improvement in efficiencies of resource use and bolstering against strong fluctuations that result in increased occurrence of droughts and floods. Consequences for agriculture are felt in decreasing productivity of soils (salination and water logging) and larger inter-season yield variations.
  • Objective – To increase the adaptive capacity of agriculture and food production systems
  • Approach – Climate change adaptation is a fairly new field, in which tailor-made solutions have to be developed and tested that look at impact of specific interventions. These can be site- or sector-specific, but all should contribute towards the understanding how climate change risks can be dealt with. This sub-theme is connected with climate change research and capacity development activities in other BO-clusters through the cross-cutting climate change programm'.