panel haddad tuesday

From Harvest Plus to Harvest Driven: How to Realise the Elusive Potential of

Agriculture for Nutrition?

Lawrence HaddadInstitute of Development Studies

Biofortification: The First Annual Conference November 9-11, 2010

Overarching Question

What is Agriculture For?

Three sub-questions

• What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition?

• How often are the pathways created and travelled?

• What needs to be done to increase the chances of the pathways linking agriculture and nutrition?

Three sub-questions

• What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition? (Many)

• How often are the pathways created and travelled? (Much room for improvement)

• What needs to be done to increase the chances of the pathways linking agriculture and nutrition? (Some ideas)

1. What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition?

• Increased supply of nutrients from farming– Own consumption– Purchased

• Income effects– Farm productivity

farm and nonfarm rural income

– Lower food priceseffective increase in income

• Post-harvest added value

What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition?

• Increased supply of nutrients from farming– Own consumption– Purchased

• Income effects– Farm productivity

farm and nonfarm rural income

– Lower food priceseffective increase in income

• Post-harvest added value

x

• Pro-poor governance– Institutions– Incentives

• Approaches that empower women– Agency to work

the rules of the game

– Agency to define rules of game

• Nutrition Lens

What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition?

• Increased supply of nutrients from farming– Own consumption– Purchased

• Income effects– Farm productivity

farm and nonfarm rural income

– Lower food priceseffective increase in income

• Post-harvest added value

x

• Pro-poor governance– Institutions– Incentives

• Approaches that empower women– Agency to work

the rules of the game

– Agency to define rules of game

• Nutrition Lens

Improved Nutrition

• Energy

• Diverse Diet• Micronutrient

status

• Body Mass Index

• Linear growth

=

What are the potential pathways between agriculture and nutrition?

• Increased supply of nutrients from farming– Own consumption– Purchased

• Income effects– Farm productivity

farm and nonfarm rural income

– Lower food priceseffective increase in income

• Post-harvest added value

x

• Pro-poor governance– Institutions– Incentives

• Approaches that empower women– Agency to work

the rules of the game

– Agency to define rules of game

• Nutrition Lens

Improved Nutrition

• Energy

• Diverse Diet• Micronutrient

status

• Body Mass Index

• Linear growth

=

Enabling environment for nutrition

2. How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

• Agricultural growth-poverty impacts– Cross-country regression results (+)

(Ligon, Christiansen, Loayza)

– Country studies (mixed)

(Datt, Ferreira)

• Agricultural growth-nutrition impacts– Cross country regression results

more positive than negative, but still mixed (Heady)

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Few ag-nutrition

impact studies to give

granularity

• SPIA– 83 income or nutrition

impact evaluations between 1995 and 2008 (out of 761)

• J-PAL in mid 2009– 35 education– 25 health– 5 agriculture

• 3ie– 2 of 18 in round 1 on

agriculture• ALINe

– 6 of 50 large proposals to a key Foundation contained impact evaluation designs

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Impact studies not

systematically organised

• Protocols for inclusion– Clearly defined agricultural

intervention– Clearly defined nutrition

outcome– Quality of impact design– Quality of data collection– Quality of study

implementation– Balance of interpretation

• Regression meta analysis of studies

– Features of interventions which have the biggest nutrition impacts in studies?

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

No studies yet of the

nutrition impacts of bio-

fortification

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Few ag-nutrition

impact studies to give

granularity

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Few ag-nutrition

impact studies to give

granularity

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

Impact studies not

systematically organised

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Few ag-nutrition

impact studies to give

granularity

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

Impact studies not

systematically organised

No studies yet of the

nutrition impacts of bio-

fortification

How often are the pathways created and travelled?

Few ag-nutrition

impact studies to give

granularity

Macro agricultural growth and

poverty: fairly convincing but crude

Impact studies not

systematically organised

No studies yet of the

nutrition impacts of bio-

fortification

• Difficult to say• My guess is that there is

plenty of room for improvement

3. What needs to be done to increase the chances of the pathways

linking agriculture and nutrition?

Create an Enabling Environment

Mapping Nutrition in Real Time

Unicef Malawi and Columbia University

Capitalise on the increasing need to demonstrate impact

Growth diagnostics: from economics to nutrition

Source: Doing Growth Diagnostics in Practice: A ‘Mindbook’ Ricardo Hausmann, Bailey Klinger, Rodrigo Wagner CID Working Paper No. 177 September 2008. Harvard University.

Nutrition Commitment IndicesIndicators: Hunger, Legal Framework, Spending on

Agriculture, Social Protection

Build the next generation of agriculture-nutrition champions

MacArthur Foundation’s Masters in Development Practice

Conclusion

www.alineplanning.org

improved nutritionGovernance

and GenderEnabling

Environment for nutrition

High productivity agriculture

From Harvest Plus to Harvest Driven

Agriculture cannot be the prime shaper of nutrition,

but…

Agriculture cannot be the prime shaper of nutrition,

but…..nutrition

should be the prime shaper of

(public ) agriculture...

From Harvest Plus to Harvest Driven

Agriculture cannot be the prime shaper of nutrition,

but…..nutrition

should be the prime shaper of

(public ) agriculture... ..what else is

agriculture for?

From Harvest Plus to Harvest Driven

Thank You