Progress on food systems transformations

Measuring Food Systems Transformations

Monday, 24th July, 09:30-10:30

Transforming food systems requires regularly updated information across a number of sectors to guide interventions. This session will position the importance of monitoring food systems by introducing the work of the independent Food Systems Countdown to 2030 Initiative (FSCI) that has developed a rigorous, science-based information system to track progress and guide action. It will showcase four countries who can speak to their priorities and experience around integrated monitoring. The participants will have the opportunity to learn more about the potential to use the FSCI’s indicator framework as a point of reference for the development of national monitoring systems.

With less than a decade remaining to achieve the SDGs the global community faces a critical juncture to transform agri-food systems. This transformation needs a mechanism based on a set of indicators across sectors that could guide decision makers towards more coherent and integrated policies. In late 2021, the FSCI published an architecture comprised of five thematic areas to monitor food systems aliging closely to the Action Areas identified in the UN Secretary-General Chair’s Summary, and many country Food Systems transformation pathways. A consultative process to select a set of existing indicators resulted in 50 indicators for which a global baseline of food systems has been compiled (Schneider et al., under review).

Governments and other stakeholders have repeatedly called for better data and support to guide action and to monitor impacts. The indicator framework developed by the FSCI provides guidance and a feasible menu of indicators of direct relevance to food systems actors looking to track and measure the transformations ongoing. The session will confront the framework with current monitoring priorities and needs of countries and discuss the potential for using it as a guiding tool for the development of national monitoring systems or to update and expand existing ones, as countries aim to implement their transformation pathways.