After the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, systems for their implementation have been put in place in Japan and around the world, and they are now highly recognized.　

The stability and sustainability of the food system is related to the achievement of many of the SDGs. Today, we would like to introduce the FAO report Tracking progress on food and agriculture-related SDG indicators 2021, which summarizes the progress of SDGs food and agriculture-related indicators released last September. In order to gain a more comprehensive picture of progress of the 2030 Agenda in addressing rural poverty and inequality, FAO has launched the Strategic Framework 2022-2031 focusing for the first time on more efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable agri-food systems and guided by SDG1 No poverty, SDG2 No hunger, and SDG 10 Reducing inequalities. In the report, the following points about the current situation are discussed.

• COVID-19 pandemic could push another 83-132 million people into chronic hunger in 2020.
• Progress in the area of food and agriculture remains inadequate.
• Global food loss of 13.8% occurs after harvest on farms and during transport, storage, and processing.
• Disparities in incomes and productivity of small-scale and large-scale food producers.
• Rate of growth of global holdings of plant genetic resources has slowed over the past decade
• Share of countries with high or moderately high general food prices has increased sharply in 2020
• Global water stress is in the safe zone at 18.4%, but certain regions, such as Western and Northern Africa and Southern Asia, have very high levels of water stress of over 70%.
• Global progress in regulatory and institutional frameworks to protect access rights for small-scale fisheries and international documentation to address illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing
• Global forest area decreased from 31.9% in 2000 to 31.2% in 2020.
• The area of mountain green coverage has remained stable globally.

The report also mentions the contribution of the private sector to the SDGs in the section “Guidance on core indicators for agrifood systems: Measuring the private sector's contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals”. 

References
¹⁾ Tracking progress on food and agriculture-related SDG indicators 2021. https://www.fao.org/3/cb6872en/cb6872en.pdf
²⁾ Strategic Framework 2022-31. https://www.fao.org/3/cb7099en/cb7099en.pdf
³⁾ Guidance on core indicators for agrifood systems -Measuring the private sector’s contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals-. https://www.fao.org/3/cb6526en/cb6526en.pdf

Related Pick Up: 

• Pick Up 134. Progress Report on Food and Agriculture-related SDG Indicators 2020
• Pick up 82. Sustainable Development Report 
• Pick up 83. Sustainable Development Report 2020 – Japan's SDG Achievements
• Pick up 330. Sustainable Development Report 2021: SDG Progress Reversed for the First Time

Contributor: KANAMORI Norihito (Information and Public Relations Office)