For the first time, the UK Met Office has issued the Red alert warning of health risks due to an extreme heatwave predicted for the week of July 18/19. This is the first time that temperatures above 40°C have been predicted in the U.K., a tenfold increase in probability under anthropogenic climate change. The EU also issued a warning that nearly half of the EU and the U.K. are at risk of drought, citing concerns over the impact on crop production.

The State Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022 by UN agencies (FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP, WHO) has recently been released. Today, with the permission of the FAO Liaison Office in Japan, we would like to share with you excerpts of the key messages regarding the food and nutrition situation.

The Mekong Delta, located in southern Vietnam, is the country's largest paddy rice cropping region, with fertile lowlands and abundant rainfall. In recent years, the area planted with rice has been expanding, and measures to cope with greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, including methane, and water demand are required. Using farmer survey data, JIRCAS evaluated the effects of year-round implementation of alternate wetting and drying (AWD) technology on farmers’ profits and GHG emissions reduction, and showed that it is an agricultural system with co-benefit that both increases farmers' profits and reduces environmental impacts from agriculture.

The United Nations Population Fund reports that the world's population in 2022 will be 7.954 billion, an increase of 79 million from last year.To coincide with World Population Day on July 11, we have created a dashboard that shows the population trends of countries around the world. Check out the past and future population trends of countries around the world.

The 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, which was to discuss an international framework for biodiversity conservation, has been postponed several times due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but it has finally been announced that the conference will be held in December in a different venue. The success of the international agreement depends on a scientific approach to identify the direct and indirect drivers of nature loss, and a fundamental rethinking of human behaviors behind them.

Japan experienced a series of hot days in late June, and the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) has announced preliminary estimates that the rainy season has ended record early in various parts of eastern and western Japan and in the southern Tohoku region. Heat waves have been reported in many parts of the world since the beginning of this year, especially in India, Pakistan, and most of South Asia since March, with some estimates suggesting that the probability of heat waves has increased 30-fold due to human-induced climate change. In recent years, methods for rapidly estimating the causal relationship between extreme weather events and climate change have improved.

Professor Cheryl L. Hendriks of the University of Pretoria, South Africa, contributed an article to the June 23, 2022 issue of Nature journal titled “Sustainable small-scale fisheries can help people and the planet”. Also on June 29, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) released the 2022 edition of The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture (SOFIA).

Vegetables and fruits are beneficial to the health of people and the planet. However, they also face challenges such as food loss, food miles, and climate change. This issue features an editorial from Nature Food.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) have compiled a report on the current state of digital agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa. Findings from the country-by-country analysis are presented, along with recommendations for future action.