The CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH) is led by IFPRI with six other managing partners and is funded by USAID and other donors.
Launched in 2012, A4NH seeks to realize the enormous potential of agricultural development to improve nutrition and health worldwide, while placing strong emphasis on gender and equity. A4NH completed its first phase in 2016. In 2017, the program launched its second phase, which includes new flagships on food systems for healthier diets and improving human health.
A4NH achievements include the following:
- partnering with the public and private sectors to scale up nutrition- and health-sensitive innovations such as the development and application of aflasafe™, a technology that controls aflatoxin in crops, through a joint effort by USDA and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, an A4NH managing partner;
- conducting rigorous impact evaluations that document the effects of nutrition-sensitive agricultural programs such as biofortification of vitamin A, iron, and zinc on maternal and child health and nutrition outcomes, and on women’s empowerment;
- developing new frameworks and tools for understanding the pathways through which agricultural development influences nutrition outcomes, and integrating these frameworks and tools into USAID planning and programming through a global learning and evidence exchange (GLEE); and
- examining evidence on options for assessing and improving food safety in informal markets, where the poor buy and sell perishable, nutritious foods; together with USAID, the International Livestock Research Institute, an A4NH managing partner, has applied this research to global efforts to improve food safety in informal, formalizing, and formal food markets, including both domestic and export markets.
