Climate Change, food and nutrition security and health are closely interlinked. Climate change undermines the ability of people to move out of poverty and compromises their full enjoyment of human rights, with disproportionate impacts on those who are more vulnerable and have contributed least to the problem.

Unsustainable development, environmental degradation and climate change, volatile markets and governance issues have led to resource scarcity, poverty and food and nutrition insecurity in many regions.   

While almost 1 billion people suffer from under-nutrition, more than a billion adults worldwide were overweight in 2010, and 500 million adults are clinically obese.

Agriculture was a major focus today in Durban as part of the 17th annual UN Climate Change Conference. The effects of climate change on food production, ranging from droughts and floods to the even moderate shifts in temperature and conditions that can dramatically change the yields or viability of staple crops constitutes one of the major ways that climate change endangers health around the world. 

Healthy food. Sustainable farming. In addition to supporting the public’s health, did you know that these strategies also provide important solutions to climate change?

I just watched Weathering Change, a powerful new documentary on climate change and women, produced by our colleagues at Population Action International (PAI).

Climate change affects everyone, but it does not affect everyone equally. A growing body of evidence shows that men and women suffer different negative health consequences and employ gender-differentiated coping mechanisms in the face of climate change. Men suffer psychological, economic and social strain. However, women remain disproportionately affected, and for poor women in less developed countries, climate change can impact nearly ever facet of their lives.

This week, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke at an event during the United Nations General Assembly in New York. The event, titled Women and Agriculture: A Conversation on Improving Global Food Security, consisted of a panel of leaders from the UN, civil society, private sector, and government.

A severe drought in the Horn of Africa is exacerbating an ongoing food crisis, one that affects close to 10 million people in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia. Some aid groups are calling the situation a "pre-famine" — and the situation threatens to get much worse.

The UN Committee on World Food Security is increasingly concerned about climate change and has conducted a study on the effects climate change may have on food security and agricultural productivity. A draft paper is available for online comment through July 1.

This morning, I came across a slideshow presentation put together by the World Health Organization (called "Health, climate change, and WHO"). Most of it was a review of the same basic science ClimateHealthConnect is conveying: that climate affects human health in a number of ways while reducing greenhouse gases improves human health both immediately and over time.