Crisis resilience ‘critical' to stem rising hunger

Speed read Crises, shocks and volatility to food systems becoming the new norm Policy focus should shift to ‘permanent crisis resilience' – report Local groups could be key to gender inclusion, data collection [SYDNEY] A shift towards permanent "crisis resilience” from short-term aid is crucial to mitigate increasingly frequent shocks to the global food system and tackle rising global hunger, say food policy researchers. Rob Vos, IFPRI's director of markets, trade and institutions, says a closer connection is needed between early warning systems that monitor global food market volatility and those that monitor food insecurity at the local level. "Both systems further need to pay more attention to monitoring the risk factors that underly food supply or price shocks as that cause food crises,” Vos tells SciDev.Net.

A united approach to promoting healthy living behaviours and associated health outcomes: a global call for policymakers and decisionmakers.

Chronic disease pandemics have challenged societies and public health throughout history and remain ever-present. Despite increased knowledge, awareness and advancements in medicine, technology, and global initiatives the state of global health is declining. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has compounded the current perilous state of global health, and the long-term impact is yet to be realised. A coordinated global infrastructure could add substantial benefits to public health and yield prominent and consistent policy resulting in impactful change. To achieve global impact, research priorities that address multi-disciplinary social, environmental, and clinical must be supported by unified approaches that maximise public health. We present a call to action for established public health organisations and governments globally to consider the lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic and unite with true collaborative efforts to address current, longstanding, and growing challenges to public health.

Vaccine Strategy During the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Community Engaged Research Supporting a Policy Oriented Towards Nonprofit Organizations and Volunteers

In the face of the Covid-19 crisis, vaccination was the medical tool and nonprofit organizations have tried to reduce its social impact. Nevertheless, they are mostly constituted of elderly volunteers, who chose to suspend their commitment. In France, within community-engaged research, a proposition from practitioners was to adapt the health strategy by including volunteers in the vaccine strategy. A survey dedicated to these topics and testing the proposition in January-February 2021 obtained 1,862 responses from volunteers. It confirms that the pandemic has disrupted volunteering and that the vaccination of volunteers would allow NPOs to reduce the lack of human resources.

The Effect of E-Commerce on Increasing Consumption Behavior During a Pandemic

The rapid development of technology and ease of information today greatly affects all aspects of life. During the COVID-19 pandemic, technology played an important role in maintaining community activities continued smoothly despite being hampered by several health policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many phenomena develop with new technologies in several fields, one in the economic field is e-commerce. E-commerce is a site that makes it easier for buyers to get the goods desired by the community, as well as the various interesting promos that are the attractiveness of the community to constantly shop in e-commerce so that the community applies consumptive behavior. So that the problem that will be discussed in this study is the development of e-commerce technology that affects people's behavior in shopping which tends to be consumptive and hedonic. The purpose of this study is to determine the impact or effect of the use of e-commerce on consumptive behavior during the pandemic period and provide an overview of the potential regarding e-commerce in the future. This research method is quantitative. The data collection technique used for this study is to use a questionnaire. Thus, this research is expected to minimize the negative impacts that can be caused by the increasing consumptive behavior of society during the pandemic and provide wise e-commerce use. The results of this study can be seen from calculations using a formula that respondents tend to be more extravagant during the pandemic and for future potential, respondents will certainly enjoy the convenience provided by e-commerce. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

THE ROLE OF FOOD AID PROGRAMS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE FOR POST GRADUATE STUDENTS

Food insecurity is a phenomenon affecting many developed countries, among them susceptible to food insecurity are tertiary students. Food insecurity affects the livelihoods of students and is a global problem. This causes doubt and anxiety which affects the educational outcome of students and losing focus on academic excellence. This study focuses on student food security and the role of campus food aid programs at the University of the Western Cape. Food security is an important aspect of people's lives globally. While food insecurity is a significant challenge experienced by many South Africans nationally. Thus, necessary to shed light on the challenges of food among tertiary institutions and the relevance of food aid programs. The present study employed a mixed method which has provided both significant elements of quantitative and qualitative research methods. A comprehensive review of the literature was employed, this includes both academic literature and grey literature on student food insecurity globally, nationally, and at UWC. Primary data and secondary data were collected to answer the research questions. The quantitative element of this study was conducted through an online questionnaire with thirty postgraduate students. While the qualitative element was conducted semi-structured with ten postgraduate students. Students from low socio-economic backgrounds, without funding, covid 19, and expensive food on campus are some of the main causes of food insecurity. Students experiencing food insecurity have lost interest in their academics, performed less than their potential in academic assessments, some have failed the academic year and dropping out before time. The discontinuation of some food aid programs has increased the demand for food and the need for more food initiatives to be established. The role of food aid programs provided positive results in the alleviating of food insecurity during covid 19 and have proven consistency in the provision of food. This study aimed to bring awareness about the existence of food insecurity among postgraduate students. Stakeholders of the university, policymakers, and researchers must take into consideration the various effects of food insecurity and investigate the alleviation strategies. This prevents the increase in dropping out, students repeating the academic year, and getting an improvement in academic excellence and graduation rates.

Strategy research of economic policy to improve unemployment in COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has severely impacted the health, economic, and sense of well-being of many nations worldwide, drastically changing and disrupting the daily lives of everyone in all levels of society. In South Korea, in particular, the pandemic destabilized many businesses, crippled production and services delivery, and debilitated work flows on such a massive scale, leading to high levels of unemployment and production shutdowns rarely experienced by the country before. This prompted the South Korean government to come up with national policies to revitalize the country's plunging levels of productivity by getting the nation's executives, managers, professionals, and labour force back to work by coming out with massive emergency programmes to protect their health, safety, and fitness to work in the midst of the lingering pandemiC. In this study that we hope will contribute to the effectiveness of the ongoing national stimulus measures, we conducted a formal evaluation of the initiatives, policies, and efforts undertaken by the South Korean government to reduce the national unemployment rate and spur productivity in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. © 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

COVID-19 Effect: Time to Change the Way of Research

This perspective provides an insight or viewpoint about the current and future way of do-ing research. The opinion includes the limitations of the research in the current scenario and the possible ways to improve it.Copyright © 2021 Bentham Science Publishers.

Power and politics in a pandemic: Insights from Finnish health system leaders during COVID-19.

Power and politics are both critical concepts to engage with in health systems and policy research, as they impact actions, processes, and outcomes at all levels in health systems. Building on the conceptualization of health systems as social systems, we investigate how power and politics manifested in the Finnish health system during COVID-19, posing the following research question: in what ways did health system leaders and experts experience issues of power and politics during COVID-19, and how did power and politics impact health system governance? We completed online interviews with health system leaders and experts (n = 53) at the local, regional, and national level in Finland from March 2021 to February 2022. The analysis followed an iterative thematic analysis process in which the data guided the codebook. The results demonstrate that power and politics affected health system governance in Finland during COVID-19 in a multitude of ways. These can be summarized through the themes of credit and blame, frame contestation, and transparency and trust. Overall, political leaders at the national level were heavily involved in the governance of COVID-19 in Finland, which was perceived as having both negative and positive impacts. The politicization of the pandemic took health officials and civil servants by surprise, and events during the first year of COVID-19 in Finland reflect recurring vertical and horizontal power dynamics between local, regional, and national actors. The paper contributes to the growing call for power-focused health systems and policy research. The results suggest that analyses of pandemic governance and lessons learned are likely to leave out critical factors if left absent of an explicit analysis of power and politics, and that such analyses are needed to ensure accountability in health systems.

Then there were seven: a commentary on creating a public involvement strategy group for a policy research unit in behavioural science.

The National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Policy Research Unit in Behavioural Science (PRU-BS) was funded to inform government on the application of behavioural science in health and social care policy. What makes this unit different to other topic specific ones, was the wide range of its brief. Because of this, the PPI group would need to include a wide range of experience and expertise and be prepared to learn. We were a different type of public group for a different type of task. This paper deals with how we approached this. In this paper we outline how the PPI plan in the funding proposal for the PRU-BS was adapted to real world challenges. We describe the stages in the formation of the PPI Strategy Group and how a virtual platform was created to ensure good communication. We discuss our pragmatic approach of developing Terms of Reference and a PPI strategy document. Given the restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic we explain how we tackled PPI SG member induction sessions, meetings and training sessions. To illustrate how the group operates we provide an example of our involvement in a PRU-BS project. Central to our paper is the lessons we learned. We hope the challenges we met in forming the unique PPI SG, how these were overcome, and our recommendations will help others faced with a similar task.

The Policy Research Unit in Behavioural Science (PRU-BS) was formed in early 2019, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The aim of the unit is to advise the government on the use of behavioural science (the study of human behaviour) to inform health and social care policy. From the outset the aim was to embed PPI in all aspects of the unit's work from the governance and direction of the unit to the individual research projects it conducts. As behavioural science cuts across all aspects of health, recruiting members of the public to work within the PRU-BS required careful thought. In this paper we describe the processes of recruiting to our PPI Strategy Group, the induction and training, and the ways in which we worked to develop the group and become embedded within the unit. Lastly, we present several recommendations based on our experiences of forming the PPI Strategy Group. Although this is aimed primarily at those contemplating setting up a group whose remit extends beyond a single research project, we hope this will be a useful resource for the public, researchers and others working in PPI.

Upcycling e-waste trash into innovative treasure

Renewable energy associations note that solar panels installed in the early-2000s solar energy boom are now reaching the end of their 25- to 30-year lifespan. Benjamin Sovacool, of the University of Sussex’s Science Policy Research Unit, describes how the developed world’s attempt to reduce its carbon footprint has led to environmental and public health risks, gender discrimination, child labour, and ethnic discrimination in the global South. Markus Spitzbart, head Sustainable E-Waste Management in Ghana, German Corporation for International Cooperation Furthermore, the German Corporation for International Cooperation (GIZ) has set up a project to create new centres and training courses for e-waste recycling and disposal methods for recyclers and scrap collectors.

Pioneering anti-poverty policies in Brazil and Mexico: ambiguities and disagreements on conditional cash transfer programs

Purpose>Focusing on the conditional cash transfers (CCTs) first created and implemented in Brazil and Mexico, this article takes a new look at the factors facilitating the creation of these innovative policies. In order to shed light on the continuous struggles that are faced when pioneering, formulating and adopting these anti-poverty policies, the authors analyze three types of ambiguities: axiological, partisan and electoral.Design/methodology/approach>Based on a gradual institutional change approach within the advocacy coalition framework, the authors conduct a qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews, official public administration archives and newspapers.Findings>This article demonstrates that advocacy coalitions (for human capital, basic income and food security) and the quest for electoral gains are viable contexts for exploring the complex processes involved in setting up CCTs, of which Brazil's Bolsa-Família and Mexico's Progresa-Oportunidades-Prospera (POP) provide emblematic examples.Originality/value>The findings contribute to comparative social policy research and institutional change analysis. The coalitions and ambiguous consensuses studied here expand the perspectives with a more detailed understanding of the chaotic processes involved in developing social policies.

ČAS PANDEMIJE IN IZZIVI SOCIALNEGA DELA V SLOVENIJI IN PO SVETU

Pandēmija covida-19 je přinesla radikalne spremembe v življenju ljudi po vsem svetu. Da bi bolje razumeli obseg in značilnosti vpliva časa pandemije na etično raven prakse socialnega dela, je mednarodna skupina raziskovalk in raziskovalcev v sodelovanju z Mednarodno zvezo socialnih delavk in delavcev (IFSW) maja 2020 izvedla spletno anketo, na katero so se odzvale socialne delavke in delavci iz 55 držav po svetu;anketa je zajela 607 odgovorov v sedmih jezikih. V pričujočem članku so predstavljeni rezultati slovenskega dela raziskave, in sicer v kontekstu širših, globalnih ugotovitev raziskave. Analiza odgovorov na anketo je podala šest osrednjih tem, ki so se pojavile po vsem svetu, in tudi v Sloveniji (n =14), v različnih kontekstih socialnodelovne prakse, socialnih politik ter družbenoekonomskih in epidemioloških pogojev.Alternate :The Covid-19 pandemic has induced radical changes in the lives of people across the globe. To better understand the scope and characteristics of the pandemic's impact on the ethics of social work practice, an international group of researchers, in collaboration with the International Federation of Social Workers, conducted an online survey in May 2020. Social workers from 55 countries responded, contributing 607 responses in seven languages. The present article presents the results of the Slovenian part of the research, in the context of broader, global findings of the research. The analysis of the responses to the survey provided six central themes that emerged worldwide and in Slovenia (n = 14), in varied contexts of socio-work practices, social policies, socio-economic and epidemiological conditions.

Precarious but popular? The German mini-job scheme in comparative research on work and welfare

This review paper critically examines a range of analytical frameworks used to analyse the German mini-job scheme in comparative research on work and welfare. The approaches examined include labour market dualisation in comparative political economy research and welfare-to-work policies in comparative social policy research. The paper claims that using stylized facts instead of a thorough understanding of the broader context of national employment and social systems leads to misinterpretations in terms of policy learning. By describing the institutional context and main drivers of the evolution of mini-jobs over time, based on variety of data sources, statistics and empirical studies, the paper addresses the critical role of this specific employment scheme for gender equality, largely ignored in the comparative literature.

Futures-oriented drugs policy research: Events, trends, and speculating on what might become.

One concern in the field of drugs policy is how to make research more futures-oriented. Tracing trends and events with the potential to alter drug futures are seen as ways of becoming more prepared. This challenge is made complex in fast evolving drug markets which entangle with shifting social and material relations at global scale. In this analysis, we argue that drugs policy research orientates to detection and discovery based on the recent past. This narrows future-oriented analyses to the predictable and probable, imagined as extensions of the immediate and local present. We call for a more speculative approach; one which extends beyond the proximal, and one which orientates to possibilities rather than probabilities. Drawing on ideas on speculation from science and technology and futures studies, we argue that speculative research holds potential for more radical alterations in drugs policy. We encourage research approaches which not only valorise knowing in relation to what might happen but which conduct experiments on what could be. Accordingly, we trace how speculative research makes a difference by altering the present through making deliberative interventions on alternative policy options, including policy scenarios which make a radical break with the present. We look specifically at the 'Big Event' and 'Mega Trend' as devices of speculative intervention in futures-oriented drugs policy research. We illustrate how the device of Mega Trend helps to trace as well as to speculate on some of the entangling elements affecting drug futures, including in relation to climate, environment, development, population, drug production, digitalisation, biotechnology, policy and discourse.

What place does nurse-led research have in the COVID-19 pandemic?

AIM: Reflect upon the visibility of nursing-led research during the COVID-19 pandemic. BACKGROUND: The emerging SARS-CoV-2 infection has galvanized collaborative and multidisciplinary efforts in clinical and research practice worldwide. The scarce evidence-base to manage patients with COVID-19 has included limited nurse-led research. INTRODUCTION: Clinical research nurses have greatly contributed to the delivery of COVID-19 research, yet the number of COVID-19 nursing-led research papers appears to be limited, with even fewer nurse-led research projects funded. METHODS: Authors' views and PubMed search on 'COVID-19 and nursing'. FINDINGS: There is a dearth of nursing-led research. Most papers describe the nursing contribution to COVID-19 care, changes in nursing working arrangements and emotional burden. There are opportunities to explore the consequences to vulnerable population groups of public health measures implemented to stop the progress of the COVID-19 pandemic. DISCUSSION: Workforce gaps, limited integration in research structures and clinical redeployment may have hampered nurse-led research. COVID-19 may exacerbate staffing deficits by disrupting the education pipeline, obstructing the transition from clinical to academic practice, particularly in areas where clinical academic roles are yet to emerge. CONCLUSION: The absence of nurse-led research in COVID-19 can be explained by chronic, underlying factors and the features of the pandemic response. Emerging models of care, effective staffing and inequalities related to COVID-19 appear obvious research areas. Nursing leadership needs to strengthen its political voice and lobbying skills to secure nurse-led research funding. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING POLICY: Embracing international nursing research, strengthening collaborations and lobbying policymakers for investment in nurse-sensitive research would enhance the response to COVID-19.