The 2016 Rice Bowl Index (RBI) annual report is now live. The RBI is designed to translate the complexity of food security into an opportunity for action, the RBI aims to improve lives in Asia by helping to enable a robust and sustainable food system.

Highlighting changes in the food security landscape in APAC over the last twelve months, the RBI has seen a decline in food security robustness scores across the region - a first since the inaugural RBI report in 2012.

To combat this, the report recommends that collectively, there must be a greater focus on the needs of smallholder farmers. The aim of collaboration is to improve smallholder resilience and to create functioning markets with price transparency, information flow and communication, transportation and storage, finance, knowledge transfer and extension and equality (click here to download the full report).

Despite this short-term decline, the long-term food security landscape for Asia remains positive, due to an expected increase in focus on food safety, waste and quality across the food value chain. Collaboration, accessibility and inclusivity are key to improving robustness and ultimately driving this positive increase going forward.

Food security is a complex issue, consisting of many components and interactions. The Rice Bowl Index is an initiative designed to facilitate productive dialogue, collaboration and action between governments, NGOs and the private sector, moving from simply identifying problems to finding solutions. To learn more about the Rice Bowl Index and Frontier Strategy Group’s involvement in the initiative, please visit www.ricebowlindex.com

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