The new coronavirus, emerged in Wuhan, China in December 2019, turned into a major global pandemic and has caused many deaths around the world. Covid-19 pandemic has adversely affected every aspect from economy, education to health system. During Covid-19 pandemic, access to foodstuffs has become even more important, and some countries have imposed restrictions on exports of basic food items for fear of food shortages. These restrictions and quotas are feared to disrupt the flows of trade for staple foods such as wheat, corn and rice, which has deepened the concerns for food security. This study was conducted to examine the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on wheat price, production and trade and to review the policies of wheat exporter countries. According to the results of the study, Covid-19 did not cause fear in wheat markets, and no shortages of wheat are expected in the short term. Although countries have reduced the measures they have taken as of May, uncertainties regarding food safety still persist for the coming years. World economies have shrunk significantly as a result of the drastic measures they have taken against covid-19, which could worsen the situation for low income households.

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is the most important staple cereal crop which is consumed by more than 50% of world population. It contributes 23% and 50% of total calories consumed by world and Nepalese population respectively. Among various abiotic factors affecting rice, rice blast is the most disastrous, causing 70-80% yield loss. This disease was originated in China around 7000 years ago. In Nepal, it was first reported in Thimi, Bhaktapur in 1966. It is caused by a filamentous ascomycete fungus Magnaporthe oryzae (Anaemorphic form- Pyricularia oryzae). It infects all the developmental stage of plant and produce symptoms on the leaf, collar, neck, panicle and even in the glumes. It decreases the rice production by an amount, enough to feed 60 million people every year. Cloudy weather, high relative humidity (93-99%), low night temperature (15- 20°C), longer duration of dew is the most favorable condition for the outbreak of disease. The most usual approaches for the management of rice blast diseases are management in nutrient fertilizer and irrigation, application of fungicides and plantation of resistant cultivars. Besides, the use of extracts of C. arabica are reported to have an inhibitory effect on the disease. Seed treatment with Trichoderma viridae @ 5ml/lit of water have also been found effective. The chemical means of controlling blast disease shall be reduced, instead eco-friendly measures like biocontrol agents, resistant varieties, plant extracts can be practiced for disease control. Different forecasting model can be used in order to predict the disease prevalence.

Cumilla Sadar Dakshin region is highly diverse in respect to land types, topography, agro-ecology, land-use pattern, cropping systems and crop variability & variety. Agricultural development of the region largely depends on the reliable and comprehensive statistics of the existing cropping cultivation and its related system adopted by the farmers. To investigate the homestead vegetable production and its impact on family nutrition, food security, income generation as well as involvement of female members a survey study was conducted at Cumilla Sadar Dakshin during 2019. A total of 150 selected homesteads were surveyed for this purpose through developed questionnaire and focus group discussion. Both primary and secondary data has been collected from different sources to fulfill the objectives of the study. The results of this study indicated that the farmer’s age, marital status, education level, farm size, source of income, women participation etc. Farmer’s knowledge and farming experiences, perception and attitude differs on different demographic conditions like: age, sex, education, farm size, training which significantly influence the adoption of modern technologies provided by different organizations. The results also showed that women contribution in homestead vegetable production is high in medium farmer’s category 41.67% and low in small farmers 36.36% respectively. The highest number of total vegetables was produced by the medium farmer (63,732 kg/year) followed by small (39,445 kg/year) and marginal farmer (25,514 kg/year). This study provides some recommendation which might impacts on betterment of farmers’ occupational and socio-economic condition by establishing proper policy and legislation both in local and national level administration as well as agricultural extension.

The study assesses the two approaches of feminization: labor and managerial, and explores the implication of feminization in agricultural production in Gorkha and Chitwan district of Nepal. We examine the degree to which men, women or men and women jointly make agriculture-related decisions, and discuss the labor feminization and managerial feminization using five domains of the Women Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI), relative to the degree to which women’s decision-making power relates to the feminization of agriculture leading to women empowerment and food security. The results revealed that the average workload for women (86.50 hours/week) was more than that for men (55.52 hours/week). Workload was found significantly affected by the total cultivated area (ha), gender of household head, occupation, number of livestock holdings, number of children, number of elders and household location.All aspects of operational and strategic decision making were dominated by jointly made decisions, except in the case of income utilization where female showed dominance. The implication of feminization in agriculture is reflected by reduction in cropping cycle, lower productivity of cereals and vegetables which led to food insecurity by own production. The income from remittance was observed to be mainly used for consumption purposes to ensure food security. It appears that the feminization of agriculture leads to women playing not only important role in decision-making but also more responsibilities and heavier workloads without necessarily resulting in empowerment and improvement in well-being.

Accelerating agricultural growth remains one of the most urgent goal of Ethiopia as the agricultural sector is the backbone of the Ethiopian economy. The adoption of new agricultural technologies and improved practices are particularly important in increasing agricultural production. This comprises strengthening legumes adoption and production as it contributes to better food security and more sustainable farming systems. Grain legumes are necessary elements of crop production in Ethiopia. The adoption and use of legume crops have been advocated for enhanced nutrition and preserving soil resources. Different improved varieties and legume production technologies have been made available to farmers through various sectors and projects in the country. Various policy measures and initiatives have also been made in improving the adoption, technology generation and contribution of legumes to the various system. Despite their contribution and considerable initiatives, over-all level of adoption and use of legume production is still low. A wide array of technical, economic, social, and institutional factors has been found to encounter the adoption, use and production of legumes along with their value-chain. However, there are still various opportunities that different grain legumes are to be adopted and promoted to increase production and productivity. Essential interventions, innovative approaches, increased production packages and improved technologies and market access should be emphasized and integrated to strengthen grain legumes adoption and production.

The aim of this study is to evaluate the thought of food security provided in dairy products and the determinants in terms of manufacturers in South Marmara Region in Turkey. The primary data obtained from 70 dairy manufacturers were analysed by Factor Analysis and Logistic Regression Analysis. According to this, price fluctuation and increase in the distance from the place where the milk is provided, reasons such as corporatization are factors that cause the lack of food security in dairy products. On the contrary, the likelihood of providing food security in dairy products increases with the increase in financial sustainability, food safety, quantity of milk and dairy products, the ability to produce and store, the number of employees, the degree of milk use.

The study analysed the extent of vulnerability to food insecurity and household coping mechanisms among yam farmers in Ekiti State, Nigeria. Cross-sectional data were used for this study with the aid of a well-designed questionnaire. A multistage sampling procedure was used to select 360 respondents. Multinomial logit (MNL) model and Feasible Generalized Least Square (FGLS) method were employed for the data analysis. The results of the FGLS model showed that 49.3% of the households were food secure and experienced low vulnerability to food insecurity. However, 30.23% of them were food insecure and highly vulnerable; they are considered as chronically food-insecure households. Also, the study revealed that 11.01% of the food secure households may be food insecure in the future if necessary attention and intervention are not given by both households and the government. Again, 9.4% of the households that were experiencing food shortage, as at the time of the study, may recover in the future. The findings of MNL revealed that the age of the household head, main occupation, household size, land size, net household income, and membership in a cooperative society were the main significant factors in yam farming households' decision to use coping strategies. As a result, it is recommended that leveraging the potential role of coping mechanisms already used by households during food shortages, and building a comprehensive human capital development, such as education, will be vital policy options to reduce food insecurity.

This paper aims to analyze: 1) food security of urban female-headed households (FHH) in Jambi Province, Indonesia; 2) socio-economic factors affecting the food security of urban FHH in Jambi Province. Primary data is raw data from the National Socioeconomic Survey (SUSENAS) Year 2016 in regencies/cities in Jambi Province. Food security of households is analyzed descriptively. The ordinal logistic regression model is used to analyze the socio-economic factors affecting the food security of urban FHH. The results of the study found that: 1) Of the total urban households in Jambi Province, there are 12.69 percent of FHH; 2) The proportion of urban FHH in Jambi Province that is categorized as food secure is 57,62 percent, as vulnerable is 13,33 percent, as questionable is 22,38 percent, and as food insecureis 6,67 percent; 3) Socioeconomic factors that have significant effect on food security of FHH are age, education, and employment status of female head of household, number of household members, education level of household members, and household final consumption expenditure per capita.

This study was aimed at examining gender diversified dairy farming and household level food security status and determinants of dairy cattle benefits in Haramaya district, Oromia, Ethiopia, using cross sectional data collected from randomly selected 120 sample households during year 2016 production season. Descriptive statistics and multiple linear regression models were employed for data analysis. Descriptive statistics stated that of the sample households, 71 households were found to be food secured whereas the remaining 49 household were food unsecured. Comparison of female headed and male headed dairy farming households indicated that 46.7 percent’s of female headed and 12.5 percent’s of male headed households were secured. The logistic regression result showed that female headed dairy farming participation was significantly influenced by education of household head, extension contact, cultivated land area, availability of supplementary feeds and access to market information. The impact estimation result showed that female headed have got increment in farm household’s food security status nearly by 66% than male headed households. The regression estimated coefficients indicated that dairy cattle benefits is significantly influenced by; education, access to vaccination, extension service, market information, cultivated area, milk sold on farm and fodder supplement were significant variables which affect the dairy cattle income in the study area. Therefore, policy makers should give due emphasis to the aforementioned variables to increase dairy farming benefits and improve the livelihood of rural households.

African eggplants are highly valued constituents of the Nigerian food. However, their nutritional potentials have not been fully tapped due to inadequate information on their nutritional and anti-nutritional qualities. This present study investigated the proximate, minerals, anti-nutrient contents as well as the estimation of mineral ratios and Mineral Safety Index of four selected edible solanum species namely, Solanum anguivi, S. gilo, S. menalogena and S. aethiopicum. The proximate contents (%) ranged from 4.19-5.46 (moisture content), 1.71-2.49 (crude fat), 4.57-5.45 (crude ash), 3.76-4.93 (crude protein), 5.20-6.30 (crude fiber) and 77.14-78.58 (carbohydrate). The solanum species were good sources of energy with total metabolizable energy of 1.458MJ-1.484MJ. The four solanum species contained high K, Ca, Mg, low Fe, Mn, Zn and Cu, while amount of Cd, Ni and Pb were very low. The mineral ratios of K/Na, Ca/Mg, Ca/K, Zn/Cu and [K/(Ca+Mg)] were below the minimum good ratios levels of 1.0, 4.17, 4.0, 8.0 and 2.2 respectively which are good for man. The anti-nutrient contents revealed low phytate, oxalate and cyanide levels. The calculated Phytate/Zn, Phytate/Ca and Oxalate/Ca were lower than the threshold levels and would support absorption and bioavailability of Zn and Ca in the samples while that of Phytate/Fe was above the critical value and this indicates unavailability of iron in these eggplant fruits. The mineral differences observed showed that S. menalogena and S. aethiopicum had greater minerals while the Mineral Safety Index results revealed that the body could not be overloaded with any of the minerals investigated. The eggplants are rich in fiber, ash, carbohydrate and minerals with moderate protein. The low level of the anti-nutrient is good and poses no deleterious effect when consumed. The eggplants have nutritional health benefits; hence, their consumption should be encouraged to address food insecurity in Nigeria