Selected Speaking Engagements

Hunger Is Down but Healthy Food Costs Are Up. What Should We Do?
(Food Tank podcast event with Dani Nierenberg)
Hunger declined despite reductions in official development assistance. That doesn’t mean the aid was unnecessary. The question is what might have happened had that assistance continued — hunger and undernourishment could have fallen even faster.

Understanding and Addressing the High Cost of a Healthy Diet
(The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2026 Launch)
Lowering the cost of healthy diets can help improve nutrition, address obesity and other diet-related non-communicable diseases, and make agrifood systems more resilient and sustainable. That’s why understanding the cost of a healthy diet is one of the most important entry points for transforming agri-food systems.

UN Press Briefing on the High Cost of a Healthy Diet
(“The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2026” to be launched July 21, 2026)
A healthy diet is now 25% more expensive than five years ago and out of reach for a third of the world. Closing that gap means investing in the “hardware” (infrastructure like cold chains and roads) and improving the “software” (subsidies favoring nutrition over staples) of agrifood systems.

Launch of the OECD-FAO Agricultural Outlook 2026-2035
(OECD-FAO Agricultural Outlook 2026-2035)
Future agricultural growth will depend on greater efficiency, making resilient agrifood systems essential as tighter margins leave producers more exposed to climate, market, and geopolitical shocks. Building that resilience requires better country diagnostics, smarter investments, stronger trade systems, and reliable data.

The 2026 Conflict in the Middle East: Policy Recommendations to Prevent a Global Food Crisis
(The Work We Do FAO Podcast Special Episode 3)
The world is 6–12 months away from a potential food crisis, and the decisions being made now will determine how severe it becomes. FAO’s policy recommendations outline immediate, medium-term, and structural responses to help avert a global food crisis.

The Conflict in the Middle East and Its Implications for Europe and Central Asia
(European Parliament Committee on Development Ordinary meeting)
With the Strait of Hormuz blockade posing major risks for Europe and Central Asia, the region should avoid broad market distortions and instead focus on stabilizing energy and fertilizer supply chains, protecting vulnerable households and farmers, diversifying import sources and trade routes, financing agricultural production, and building long-term resilience.

Update: Global Agrifood Implications of the 2026 Conflict in the Middle East
(The Work We Do FAO Podcast Special Episode 2)
The last vessels that cleared the Strait of Hormuz just before the closure have arrived at their destinations in late March, which means the real supply gap is only now beginning. Without agricultural inputs moving through soon, a sharp spike in food price inflation later this year could set off ripple effects reminiscent of the post-COVID crisis.

Global Agrifood Implications of the 2026 Conflict in the Middle East
(The Work We Do FAO Podcast Special Episode 1)
Unlike the war in Ukraine, which disrupted food supplies because it was a war fought between two major cereal exporters, the Strait of Hormuz closure is forcing farmers to cut fertilizer use, leading to lower yields and rise in food prices with a lag. What’s unfolding is a cascading shock across three tightly linked systems: energy, fertilizer, and food.   

Accelerating Financing for Agrifood Systems Transformation
(ECOSOC Partnership High-Level Side Event)
The trajectory of global hunger makes clear that Official Development Assistance was never designed to address it on its own. As needs outpace public funding, mobilizing private investment — grounded in strong technical analysis and supported by financial de-risking to build investor confidence — is critical.

Speaking Engagements in 2025 | 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2011-2019