It will come as no surprise to much of Pakistan’s population that their country ranks among the lowest for disaster risk management for water security in Asia, according to the Asian Water Development Outlook (AWDO).

We are pleased to announce the inauguration of Crop and Environment, an international peer-reviewed, open-access journal published by Elsevier in partnership with Huazhong Agricultural University, China.

Many smallholder farmers, especially women and other marginalized groups, face difficulty in accessing loans and other forms of credit.

The impacts of COVID-19 are being felt widely across the globe as most countries and localities urge residents to remain home to slow transmission of the disease.

Globally, COVID-19 has exposed farmers to high levels of income insecurity, underlining the importance of building resilience among male and female farmers.

In trying to limit the spread of COVID-19, policymakers globally have the difficult task of balancing the positive health effects of lockdowns against their economic costs, particularly the burdens lockdowns impose on low-income and food-insecure

Much of my research has been on the need for collective action in managing natural resources, and the value of groups to facilitate collective agency for women’s empowerment.

We now know that handwashing with soap for 20 seconds can fight the spread of coronavirus. For most of us accessing water is as simple as turning on the taps in our kitchens and toilets.

This year’s theme for World Water Day is Water and Climate Change.

Extreme weather events and other climate change-linked disasters have devastated communities globally: be it cyclones along the coast of Southern Africa, flooding in parts of Canada, drought-induced wildfires in California, or the recent El Niño (

Cyclone Idai struck Beira, the fourth largest city in Mozambique, in mid-March with torrential rains and winds of more than 190 km per hour. It took days for the sheer size of the resulting disaster to be understood.

We traced the impact of the recent price declines and considered what policy options were available to the Nigerian authorities to come up with counter measures.

This issue contains seven articles addressing the major changes underway in the integration of economies in southern Africa.

The paper by Garcia and Wanner reviews examples of gender-responsive research and programming from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to discuss those genderresponsive approaches w