Syrian food security initiative wins research support

A research programme bringing together Syrian, Turkish and UK experts to enable long-term food security for Syria is being supported as part of an international development research programme.

The initiative, SyriaFoodFutures, will form part of the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Global Challenges Research Fund Collective Programme – an investment of £147 million designed to impact global health, education, sustainable cities, food systems, conflict and resilience.

Those taking part will seek to strengthen partnerships between researchers at the Universities of Edinburgh’s Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Security and the Universities of Kent and Aberdeen with Syrian academics in Syria and in exile in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon.

Together, they will aim to create a platform for stakeholder dialogue to explore plausible long-term futures for agriculture and food production in Syria. 

Major challenges

Environmental disasters, education for children living through conflict and malnutrition are just some of the global challenges being tackled in the 141 projects being supported through the URKI awards.

The awards bring together a range of researchers and experts from across the UK and developing countries to contribute to enabling healthier and safer lives, sustainable development and prosperity.

Research across these is contributing to realising the ambitions of the UK Government’s aid strategy and progressing the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

Conflict in Syria has led to fragility of food supplies in the country and beyond. We are proud to be working with colleagues in the region, so that their expertise can inform a sustainable solution for food security.

Professor Lisa Boden

Working in partnership with developing nations, the UK’s research and innovation system has a crucial role to play in finding innovative solutions to interlinked issues such as issues such as environmental disasters, extreme poverty and food security. These international development research projects announced today are essential to finding these solutions.

Professor Andrew Thompson

Related links

Global Challenges Research Fund

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