The Malabo Montpellier (MaMo) Panel – a leading voice in African food security and agriculture policy – welcomes the G20 agenda focus on Africa but urges world leaders to ensure the continent’s farmers are at the heart of their discussions in Hamburg this weekend.

ZEF will organize a module in a new MSc course in Global Health Risk Management and Hygiene Policies at Bonn University starting from October 2017. The two-year course will be supported by the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) and aims at training leaders in implementing and monitoring of public health strategies.

The Vatican has informed ZEF-Director Prof. Dr. Joachim von Braun that he has been appointed President of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences for the next five years. Von Braun therewith succeeds the Swiss biologist and Nobel Prize winner Werner Arber.

ZEF invites to the inauguration and networking meeting of “BiomassNet: The first German-African expert network on food and non-food biomass.” On this occasion, the interactive online platform BiomassNet.org will be launched.

The DAAD has selected the Institute for Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) as a host institution of its West African Sur-Place/in-Region stipend program. ISSER and ZEF have successfully run a PhD program in Development Studies at the University of Ghana, called "Ghanaian-German Center for Development Studies (GGCDS)" since 2008.

ZEF and PARI are at the G20 conference ONE WORLD – No Hunger. Future of the rural world in Berlin, April 27-28, 2017. The conference's focus is on Innovation, Youth, Employment. Around 10 ZEF doctoral students attend the conference.

ZEF-Director Joachim von Braun member of newly founded Malabo Montpellier Panel, which consists of leading agriculture and food security experts from Africa and Europe to support efforts by African countries to sustain and accelerate the current pace of growth in order to achieve the goals set by the African Union of sharply reducing poverty and ending hunger within the next decade.

ZEF's bi-annual magazine no. 35 informs you about our latest research, doctoral studies and partnerships. ZEF's research is based on studies carried out in the field.

Advisory Board of the Climate Change Economics doctoral program of Sheikh Anta Diop University Dakar, Senegal, met with West Africa Students

Regine Weber, ZEF junior researcher, reports about her doctoral research on innovative early warning systems on food security.

The cooperation between ZEF and the International Program in Agricultural Development Studies (IPADS) of the University of Tokyo has been strengthened by a joint Symposium on "One Health for Africa and Asia" which was opened by a lecture by ZEF-Director Christian Borgemeister.

ZEF will receive funds of around 2.5 million euros for the upcoming five years from the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of Germany's Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety. The project aims at enabling experts in West Africa to strengthen the region’s input to the program of the International Council for Biodiversity.

Contribution by ZEF Director Prof. von Braun

The book and its policy lessons were discussed during a public seminar on “Food Price Risks, Food Security, and G20”.

Willis Okumu conducted and completed his doctoral research at ZEF. His research was funded by DAAD and the Right Livelihood Campus at ZEF.

The Ghanaian-German Centre for Development Studies (GGCDS) offers seven PhD-Positions at the University of Ghana, starting in August 2017. Qualified persons can apply for a four-year full-time PhD Program in Development Studies as of August 2017. The deadline for applications is March 31, 2017.

In the 2016 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report of the University of Pennsylvania, ZEF was again ranked among the world's leading think tanks.

The Food Monitor website was launched on Sunday, January 29, 2017. The Food Monitor is an early warning system providing near to real-time information about global market developments, food price volatility and global food supplies.

Bonn/Berlin, January 16, 2017. Research leaders coming together under the T20, a network of Think Tanks from the G20 countries. In a policy brief prepared for the gathering of G20 Agriculture Ministers during the Green Week in Berlin, January 20-22, 2017, they stress that sustainable agriculture can only be achieved if land, water and energy are considered jointly in policies, not in isolation.

Our ZEF Annual Report highlights research findings of our main research themes and projects.