"The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic marks the most significant, singular global disruption since World War II, with health, economic, political, and security implications that will ripple for years to come." -Global Trends 2040 (2021) Global Trends 2040-A More Contested World (2021), released by the US National Intelligence Council, is the latest report in its series of reports starting in 1997 about megatrends and the world's future. This report, strongly influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, paints a bleak picture of the future and describes a contested, fragmented and turbulent world. It specifically discusses the four main trends that will shape tomorrow's world: - Demographics-by 2040, 1.4 billion people will be added mostly in Africa and South Asia. - Economics-increased government debt and concentrated economic power will escalate problems for the poor and middleclass. - Climate-a hotter world will increase water, food, and health insecurity. - Technology-the emergence of new technologies could both solve and cause problems for human life. Students of trends, policymakers, entrepreneurs, academics, journalists and anyone eager for a glimpse into the next decades, will find this report, with colored graphs, essential reading.

The global food crisis is a stark reminder of the fragility of the global food system. The Global Food Crisis: Governance Challenges and Opportunities captures the debate about how to go forward and examines the implications of the crisis for food security in the world’s poorest countries, both for the global environment and for the global rules and institutions that govern food and agriculture. In this volume, policy-makers and scholars assess the causes and consequences of the most recent food price volatility and examine the associated governance challenges and opportunities, including short-term emergency responses, the ecological dimensions of the crisis, and the longer-term goal of building sustainable global food systems. The recommendations include vastly increasing public investment in small-farm agriculture; reforming global food aid and food research institutions; establishing fairer international agricultural trade rules; promoting sustainable agricultural methods; placing agriculture higher on the post-Kyoto climate change agenda; revamping biofuel policies; and enhancing international agricultural policy-making. Co-published with the Centre for International Governance Innovation

In the new world order, conflicts between countries are increasing. Fluctuations in the economy and imbalances in the distribution of scarce resources to developing countries can result in wars. The effect of the recent COVID-19 pandemic and economic crisis has caused changes in the strategies and policies of countries. Technological changes and developments have also triggered cyber wars. Despite this, many countries prefer to fight on the field. The damage to the international economy of wars, which kills civilians and causes serious damage to developing countries, is a current issue. The Handbook of Research on War Policies, Strategies, and Cyber Wars examines the factors that lead to war and the damages caused by war strategies and policies. It is a guide for future generations to develop constructive policies and strategies for living in a peaceful world. Covering topics such as geopolitical consequences, civil liberty, and terrorism, this major reference work is a dynamic resource for policymakers, strategists, government officials, politicians, sociologists, students and educators of higher education, librarians, researchers, and academicians.

The current international scenario with the war in Ukraine will have potential impacts on agri-food systems across the world. This scenario will change the balance of power among actors in the agri-food sector. High margins of uncertainty are common across supply chains in the face of uncontrolled increases in raw material prices and an uncertain guarantee of supply. This uncertainty is compounded by rising energy prices, putting the entire agrifood supply chain, which is highly energy-intensive, in crisis. In addition, the current war scenario could impact the demand for agricultural and food products by changing consumers' purchasing habits. Increasing the resilience of agri-food systems may need to become a priority for many national economic systems. In this scenario, the routes to achieve resilient agrifood systems are numerous and include reducing agriculture's dependence on energy, energy-intensive imports and raw material imports. Resilience also requires diversified import sources and market outlets through sound multilateral and bilateral trade policy.

Conscious of the data scarcity during the COVID-19 pandemic, FAO collaborated with the Johns Hopkins Center for a Liveable Future (CLF), within the Bloomberg School of Public Health (BSPH), to document the impacts of, and responses to, the pandemic. To do so, it conducted a systematic literature review and implemented a survey with support from Globefish, Eurofish and the other Fish Info Networks, together with case studies of Eurofish Member States.This circular describes the findings from the FAO and CLF-supported surveys, and the literature review. The report was further enriched with a collection of work from large studies across the world.

New evidence this year corroborates the rise in world hunger observed in this report last year, sending a warning that more action is needed if we aspire to end world hunger and malnutrition in all its forms by 2030. Updated estimates show the number of people who suffer from hunger has been growing over the past three years, returning to prevailing levels from almost a decade ago. Although progress continues to be made in reducing child stunting, over 22 percent of children under five years of age are still affected. Other forms of malnutrition are also growing: adult obesity continues to increase in countries irrespective of their income levels, and many countries are coping with multiple forms of malnutrition at the same time – overweight and obesity, as well as anaemia in women, and child stunting and wasting.