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Climate Change Impacts on Food and Nutritional Security in Sub Saharan Africa

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Food".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2023) | Viewed by 3579

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Paramu Mafongoya

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg 3201, South Africa
Interests: integrated soil fertility management; integrated natural resource management; biofuels and renewable energy; sustainable livelihoods and food security; climate change adaptation and mitigation; indigenous knowledge systems and natural resource management
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Maxwell Mudhara

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg 3201, South Africa
Interests: agricultural development; food security; marketing; value chain analysis; climate smart agriculture and policy analysis

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Climate change affects four pillars of food security that is availability, access, utilization, and stability. This has serious implications on nutritional security. Papers will cover the impacts of climate change on these pillars, including on crops, livestock, and fisheries

To publish up-to-date papers on the impacts of climate change on food and nutritional security. These impacts of climate change affect sustainable goals of ending hunger and malnutrition in all its forms and sustainable production and consumption as an SDG goal.

The themes are the impact of climate change on food and nutrition security on:

  1. Crops;
  2. Livestock;
  3. Fisheries;
  4. Policy related issues to the subject areas.

I/We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Prof. Dr. Paramu Mafongoya
Prof. Dr. Maxwell Mudhara
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • food availability
  • food access
  • food stability
  • utilization
  • crops livestock
  • fisheries
  • insects as food

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

19 pages, 6334 KiB  
Article
Comparing the Utility of Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) and Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) on Sentinel-2 MSI to Estimate Dry Season Aboveground Grass Biomass
by Mohamed Ismail Vawda, Romano Lottering, Onisimo Mutanga, Kabir Peerbhay and Mbulisi Sibanda
Sustainability 2024, 16(3), 1051; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16031051 - 25 Jan 2024
Viewed by 1696
Abstract
Grasslands are biomes of significant fiscal, social and environmental value. Grassland or rangeland management often monitors and manages grassland productivity. Productivity is determined by various biophysical parameters, one such being grass aboveground biomass. Advancements in remote sensing have enabled near-real-time monitoring of grassland [...] Read more.
Grasslands are biomes of significant fiscal, social and environmental value. Grassland or rangeland management often monitors and manages grassland productivity. Productivity is determined by various biophysical parameters, one such being grass aboveground biomass. Advancements in remote sensing have enabled near-real-time monitoring of grassland productivity. Furthermore, the increase in sophisticated machine learning algorithms has provided a powerful tool for remote sensing analytics. This study compared the performance of two neural networks, namely, Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) and Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN), in predicting dry season aboveground biomass using open-access Sentinel-2 MSI data. Sentinel-2 spectral bands and derived vegetation indices were used as input data for the two algorithms. Overall, findings in this study showed that the deep CNN outperformed the ANN in estimating aboveground biomass with an R2 of 0.83, an RMSE of 3.36 g/m2 and an RMSE% of 6.09. In comparison, the ANN produced an R2 of 0.75, an RMSE of 5.78 g/m2 and an RMSE% of 8.90. The sensitivity analysis suggested that the blue band, Green Chlorophyll Index (GCl), and Green Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (GNDVI) were the most significant for model development for both neural networks. This study can be considered a pilot study as it is one of the first to compare different neural network performances using freely available satellite data. This is useful for more rapid biomass estimation, and this study exhibits the great potential of deep learning for remote sensing applications. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Climate Change Impacts on Food and Nutritional Security in Sub Saharan Africa)
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16 pages, 849 KiB  
Article
Impacts of Crop Production and Value Chains on Household Food Insecurity in Kwazulu-Natal: An Ordered Probit Analysis
by Thobani Cele and Maxwell Mudhara
Sustainability 2024, 16(2), 700; https://doi.org/10.3390/su16020700 - 12 Jan 2024
Viewed by 1293
Abstract
Household food insecurity persists in the KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa, despite the significant contribution of agriculture to the country’s economy. The role that the combination of crop production systems and value chains can play in improving household food security has yet to be [...] Read more.
Household food insecurity persists in the KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa, despite the significant contribution of agriculture to the country’s economy. The role that the combination of crop production systems and value chains can play in improving household food security has yet to be addressed. This paper examines the combined effects of crop production systems and value chains on household food insecurity. A Principal Component Analysis (PCA) transformed the correlated variables into three distinct domains, namely, modern agro-production practices, sustainable market integration, and traditional knowledge. An Ordered Probit Analysis was used to determine the factors that influence household food insecurity. Household food insecurity was measured using the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) using 300 randomly selected smallholder farmers. The results showed that sustainable market integration, traditional knowledge focus, education, and livestock ownership significantly and negatively impact a household’s food insecurity. A household’s size, food expenditure, and cash credit, as well as floods, significantly and positively affect its food insecurity. Policymakers and stakeholders should prioritise the integration of a sustainable market and the preservation of traditional knowledge, while reducing the food costs, in order to combat household food insecurity. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Climate Change Impacts on Food and Nutritional Security in Sub Saharan Africa)
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