Toward Sustainable and Resilient Food Systems in Asia and the Pacific

Yasuyuki Sawada emphasized that COVID-19 reversed the gain in food security, highlighting the need for developing Asia to build back the food system better to reduce hunger and malnutrition. He presented how digitalization and technology can facilitate a post-COVID-19 transition to resilient and efficient food supply chains through institutional and legislative forms and targeted support to poor and smallholder farmers. He also highlighted that digitalization can also help social protection programs for better food security.

Malavika Bambawale

Malavika leads Engie Impact’s work out of APAC, based out of Singapore. Malavika is a well regarded sustainability professional with over 20 years of experience, including projects in clean energy, smart cities, climate change, and sustainable agriculture. She has worked with the private sector, governments, and the development sector, both in the West (UK, Europe, and US) and in Asia (Southeast Asia, India).

Marco Silvestri

Marco Silvestri is currently the Deputy Head of the Center for Sustainable Agricultural Mechanization (CSAM) of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), where he has worked since 2019, mainly on regional standards for testing of agricultural machinery, integrated management of crop residue, climate-smart mechanization solutions, gender mainstreaming and collaboration with other UN agencies in the UN Country Team in China, among others.

Jim Harkness

Jim Harkness has worked on agriculture, environment, and rural development in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) since the 1980s. He carried out field research and environmental education on behalf of the International Crane Foundation in the 1980s and early 1990s, including a year of field work in Tibet. He served as development and environment program officer for the Ford Foundation in Beijing from 1995–1999, providing grants for innovations and research on rural poverty alleviation and community-based natural resource management.

Sustainable Farming, Soft Commodities, Agro-Processing, and Food Industry

From environmental degradation to resource scarcity, the food production industry faces several major challenges. Immense innovation is needed to transform the entire agricultural sector and make it sustainable, while addressing food security. This session discusses a holistic cradle-to-grave vision for the industry based on greening agriculture, food manufacturing, and distribution.

ANJA GmBH

Food systems are a vital component of sustainable development as highlighted in this presentation. The importance of using the One Planet Living sustainability approach in addressing global challenges is also discussed.