Food

and

agriculture

We helped to develop a shared vision, with many leading organizations, including a group of leading philanthropic organizations,  to put food on a path to justly meet the mitigation and adaptation goals of the Paris Agreement in ways that foster health and nutrition, shared prosperity, and the protection and restoration of nature. We are inspired by mounting evidence that such a transition can and must deliver affordable nutrition and far-more resilient food systems, while also helping to protect and restore nature and build prosperity for all.

At Ode, our work on food and agriculture leverages and often links our expertise in climate solutions, data and artificial intelligence, philanthropic services, sustainable finance, and digital marketing and design. Partnering for impact, we collaborate with diverse groups including development banks, networks of financial institutions, civil society coalitions, multilateral organizations, and philanthropic collaborations. We can receive and make grants via a fiscal sponsorship with Radiant.Earth, a 501(c)(3).  

Our recent work helping to elevate food in the international climate agenda. In our first several months on the job we worked alongside dozens of partners helping to place food high on the global climate agenda. This phase of work culminated at the COP28 summit, where a series of efforts on which we were working came to fruition.

In Dubai, 159 national leaders, representing over 75% of global food production and emissions, along with over 200 influential organizations, pledge to support food reform. Their commitments aim to meet the Paris Agreement's climate goals on mitigation and adaptation while also addressing key issues like nutrition, nature, and shared prosperity.  

The summit also saw the release of the first UN FAO food systems transition roadmap. Conceived as an effort to do for the global food transition what the IEA’s net zero energy outlook does for the energy transition, it is a key part of a growing effort to support countries, companies, and financial institutions to ambitiously implement their newfound commitments to improve food.  

As we look to the future, COP28 was also noteworthy for playing host to several groupings of ambitious first movers on food that we expect will be crucial in raising the bar moving forward. These include the IIGCC, which elevated agriculture and food issues to the same level of priority as energy, the Alliance for Climate Champions, a high ambition club of countries striving for food systems transformation, a group of philanthropic funders who released a statement of action and pledged $302 million to ambitiously implement the new food agenda, and the Technical Cooperation Collaborative, a new grouping of multilateral, bilateral, and other technical assistance agencies.