Gender and Plant Health has often been seen as a very unusual combination, since two disciplines have a different epistemological orientation, use different languages, and have limited experience in working together.

This Publication is an Abstracts book of the 13th Arab Congress of Plant Protection (13th ACPP), organized by the Arab Society of Plant Protection (ASPP) in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture, Water Resources and Fisheries of Tunisia, represented by the National Institute of Agronomic Research of Tunisia (INRAT), held during the period 16-21 October 2022 in Hammamet, Tunisia.

Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) is a developing region characterized for its importance for global food security, producing 23 and 11% of the global beef and milk production, respectively. The region’s ruminant livestock sector however, is under scrutiny on environmental grounds due to its large contribution to enteric methane (CH4) emissions and influence on global climate change.

Enset [Ensete ventricosum (Welw.) Cheesman] is an important food security crop of the Southern Ethiopian highlands. The cultivation of enset is characterised by a wide variety of landraces, suitable to varying agro-ecological conditions and with multiple uses by households. The objective of this paper is to present enset landrace diversity, characteristics and uses in Ethiopia.

The biomedical domain has shown that in silico analyses over vast data pools enhances the speed and scale of scientific innovation. This can hold true in agricultural research and guide similar multi-stakeholder action in service of global food security as well (Streich et al. Curr Opin Biotechnol 61:217–225. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copbio.2020.01.010, 2020).

The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the Rainforest Alliance (RA) have developed improved practices for climate-smart agriculture in the cocoa sector, summarized under the term climate-smart cocoa (CSC) and is carried out as part of the CGIAR research program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS).

The detrimental impact of hydro-meteorological risks on agriculture frequently leads to food insecurity, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Hence, the agriculture communities require climate-informed decision support tools that guide adaptation measures against climate change in the agriculture sector. The climate-informed crop capability prediction tool is one of these tools to benefit user community in making tactical and strategic decisions on inputs needed for agriculture and food security sectors as early as the crop-growing season.

The impacts of climate change on food security and development in general are well known and have been well documented. ‘Climate Smart Agriculture’ (CSA) has been developed as an approach that helps to achieve “triple wins” in climate actions in agriculture through increased agricultural productivity, adaptation (supporting crops to grow in changing climate conditions), and mitigation (reducing greenhouse gas emissions where possible). Many innovative climate-smart agriculture (CSA) innovations have been developed as solutions to help farmers achieve these triple wins.

The cattle sector is strategic for both the economic development and food security of Africa, but the low availability and quality of forage puts the most vulnerable population at risk. Hybrid forages are an alternative for enhancing both food security and sustainability of the sector but adoption levels are still low in Africa, which is related to various factors such as the availability of seeds.

Cassava is an important crop in sub-Saharan Africa for food security, income generation, and industrial development. Business-oriented production systems require reliable supplies of high-quality seed. Major initiatives in Nigeria and Tanzania have sought to establish sustainable cassava seed systems.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought impacts on the food system in several ways, such as on the supply and demand of food or changes in consumer preferences. However, little is known yet about these effects but needs to be analyzed to define actions and policies for crisis mitigation and achieving food system resilience and food security.