Today, as El Niño-related droughts impact communities across East and Southern Africa, food aid shipment and distribution networks have shifted into high gear. From the U.S. Agency for International Development to the United Nations World Food Program and NGOs like CARE and Save the Children, food aid providers are stocking port warehouses in Djibouti and South Africa, as well as inland warehouses in countries like Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, and Lesotho.

“There are truly global-scale environmental challenges, and they need to be dealt with by thinking of solutions at the same scale,” said Thomas Lovejoy, a senior fellow at the United Nations Foundation, at the Wilson Center on June 29. The interaction between human population and environmental degradation is one of these challenges. [Video Below]

At USAID we recognize the threat poor sanitation combined with rapid urbanization presents to human health, dignity, and prosperity. This is why we have made urban sanitation a global priority for the Agency. During a recent visit to India, I was able to see some of the work being done to bring sanitation services to urban areas, and had the good fortune to meet some inspiring women who are advancing these efforts in their communities.

Susan Helms is a former NASA astronaut and retired member of the United States Air Force. During her time in the military, Helms flew over 30 different types of aircraft and received four Legion of Merit awards and three Defense Superior Service medals. She also holds the record for longest space walk and spent over 5,000 hours in space. She retired in 2014 with the rank of lieutenant general and now serves on the Wilson Center Board of Trustees. What did she learn over the course of such a distinguished career, much of it spent miles above the ground?

2015 was a deadly year for environmental activism. According to Global Witness, 185 activists were killed, a 60 percent increase from 2014. Of the victims, 40 percent were indigenous people, like Berta Cáceres, who spoke at the Wilson Center last year and was shot and killed in her home in Honduras this March. [Video Below]

Between 1961 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, Iraqi Kurdistan’s quest for independence has led to the violent death of an estimated 180,000 people. At least 12 independent political groups represent the Kurdish minority in the north of the country. These groups have pursued wildly different strategies to reach their goals, some orchestrating terrorist attacks or larger-scale violence, others choosing education and propaganda campaigns, the provision of social services to gain popular support, and demonstrations.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are an ambitious framework for reducing poverty and improving the lives of billions of people. They were agreed to last year by governments at the United Nations and cover developing and developed countries alike. But how will governments, NGOs, and other organizations go about actually accomplishing them over the next 15 years? [Video Below]

A working paper by Eoin Mcguire (Brown University) and Marshall Burke (Stanford University) examines the impact of food price increases on conflict in Africa. Under the hypothesis that negative income shocks contribute to the outbreak of conflict, the authors compare the effect of significant increases in food prices in communities that predominantly produce food to the effect in those that predominantly consume food. In food producing areas, conflict driven by food surplus allocations increased but conflict driven by territorial factors decreased.