Food Policy Analysis Tools

The Excessive Food Price Variability Early Warning System is a tool of the Food Security Portal that identifies periods of excessive price variability (i.e. price variability that exceeds a pre-established threshold), and it is updated on a daily basis to identify days that are within periods of high, moderate, and low price variability.

The Early Warning Hub brings together information from across Early Warning Systems in one place. Early Warning Systems (EWS) alert to the presence of food crises and related drivers, informing decision makers and saving lives.

The Food Price Monitor provides daily updates of prices in wholesale and retail markets for a wide range of food products. Alerts refer to price changes from the start of social distancing measures taken because of COVID-19 and are based on a pre-COVID-19 reference price.

As the COVID-19 pandemic spreads, social and economic relief measures—including fiscal stimulus and expansion of social safety nets—are crucial to prevent poverty and hunger from rising dramatically in developing countries.

The control panel for real-time monitoring of risk factors is an innovative tool that brings together information on various drivers of food crises, including conflict and climate-related shocks.

While the impact of rising food prices may be clear, the root causes of such price increases often are not. The role of various short- and long-term factors, such as the growth of commodities futures markets and changing levels of grain stocks, continues to be debated. This tool generates up-to-date media daily analysis of factors that may influence commodity price volatility and food security related to COVID-19.

During the current COVID-19 crisis, some national governments have moved to restrict food exports. This behavior can, in aggregate, have dire unintended consequences for vulnerable people in food-importing countries, increasing prices and exacerbating issues of food insecurity already inflamed by the COVID-19 pandemic. It may also negatively affect producers in the export-restricting countries. Similar trade policies contributed to the 2007-2008 food price crisis; may history not repeat itself.

The spread of COVID-19, as well as the wide range of policy responses enacted around the world to contain the pandemic, have exerted wide-ranging effects on agri-food systems and livelihoods.

The International Model for Policy Analysis of Agricultural Commodities and aTrade (IMPACT) explores policies that can help feed the world, reduce poverty, and protect the natural resource base. Here we examine how alternative investment scenarios affect agricultural production, productivity, and food security for the period 2010-2050 compared to a reference scenario.