Active Climate, Earth & Environment Food & Agriculture

Potential climate change effects on food security, nutrition, and health of the Mexican population. Co-designing integrated policy measures

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

Climate change is already shifting what Mexican farmers can grow and what families can afford to eat, and this project will map exactly where those pressures hit hardest. The problem is that climate models predict rising temperatures and erratic rainfall will reduce yields of staple crops like maize and beans, but no one has yet connected those agricultural shifts to real-world consequences for nutrition and public health across Mexico. This project fills that gap by linking global food markets, local crop production, and dietary changes to specific health outcomes. If successful, the research will produce risk maps showing which regions and populations face the greatest threats, alongside policy briefs and action plans co-designed with farmers, government agencies, and food system stakeholders. The project works through SINSAMAC—a legally enshrined multi-stakeholder food policy system—and CIMMYT’s Innovation Hubs, so outputs are built to feed directly into decision-making. The result could be targeted interventions that protect nutrition and health in the most vulnerable Mexican communities as the climate continues to change.

View original technical description
This project aims to address the multifaceted impacts of climate change on food security, nutrition, and health outcomes in Mexico. The project will focus on four aims: 1) assess global and national food market dynamics under climate stress, 2) analyse shifts in crop production, especially in maize and beans, and identify vulnerability hotspots, 3) evaluate health implications related to projected dietary changes, and 4) foster inclusive stakeholder engagement for co-designed policy solutions. Central to the project is the participatory approach, involving stakeholders from various sectors in discussions and workshops to refine research methodologies and outcomes. Collaboration with SINSAMAC, a multi-stakeholder food policy system recently enshrined in law to ensure the constitutional right to adequate food and existing networks like CIMMYT’s Innovation Hubs will help facilitate this process. This will ensure that the project's outputs—ranging from datasets, risk maps to policy briefs and action plans—are co-created by the populations they intend to serve. After the quantitative analysis identifies climate hotspots, we will specifically focus on three states and municipalities as a starting point for our work. Ultimately, the project seeks to inform science- driven decision-making and improve nutrition and health outcomes amidst the challenges posed by climate change.

View the original record at the funder ↗

Researchers

Daniel Mason-D'Croz (EPMC Awardee)Diego Noleto Luz Pequeno (EPMC Awardee)Juan Rivera Dommarco (EPMC Awardee)Kai Sonder (EPMC Awardee)Mishel Unar (EPMC Awardee)Natalia Palacios Rojas (EPMC Awardee)Ramya Ambikapathi (EPMC Awardee)Santiago Lopez-Ridaura (EPMC Awardee)

Related Research

Grants with similar aims, by meaning.

Food security at the forest-agriculture Interface: A complex systems analysis of ecosystem services trade-offs and tipping points
From mangrove to milpa: what determines resilience to extreme weather events in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico?
Advancing double-duty actions to address the dual threat of climate change and malnutrition
Sustainable Agricultural Intensification and the Nexus in Brazil (SAIN)
Adaptation and mitigation strategies to cope with the effects of extreme heat in developing countries: implications for climate change.

Original classification

Climate Impacts Award

Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.