ASSESSING THE EFFECT OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND SHOCKS ON FOOD SECURITY AT VARYING SCALES

• Sponsoring Institution: National Institute of Food and Agriculture
• Project Status: COMPLETE
• Funding Source: HATCH
• Reporting Frequency: Annual
• Accession No.: 1010486
• Project Start Date: Oct 1, 2016
• Project End Date: Sep 30, 2020
• Program Code: [(N/A)]- (N/A)

Recipient Organization
UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT
(N/A)
BURLINGTON,VT 05405

Performing Department
Nutritional Sciences

Non Technical Summary
There has been increasing focus on understanding the effects of climate change on agricultural systems, including necessary adaptations to ensure future food security. However, climate change is likely to affect food systems far beyond just agricultural production including through direct avenues such as transportation and trade, food storage and food safety and through more indirect impacts including agri-tourism loss. Despite the global nature of our food system there has been less focus to assess these non-production impacts and especially to understand how food security in the United States will be impacted through global climate change effects on food systems. This proposal aims to fill this gap by applying a transdisciplinary multi-methods approach to understand 1) how food security is influenced by climate factors using a global data set in multivariate models; 2) to assess how individuals in the U.S. have communicated about food on social media prior to, during and after climate shocks; 3) to determine the mental models of Vermont residents as it relates to food security and climate change. Using these multiple methods we will develop a framework for understanding potential food security impacts in the U.S. from global climate change. This proposal will be leveraged for additional funding to expand the scope of this study for future analyses.

Animal Health Component

60%

Research Effort Categories

Basic

20%

Applied

60%

Developmental

20%

Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)	Subject of Investigation (SOI)	Field of Science (FOS)	Percent
132	0430	2070	30%
704	6099	3080	60%
704	6050	3030	10%

Knowledge Area
132 - Weather and Climate; 704 - Nutrition and Hunger in the Population;

Subject Of Investigation
0430 - Climate; 6099 - People and communities, general/other; 6050 - Communities, areas, and regions;

Field Of Science
2070 - Meteorology and climatology; 3080 - Sociology; 3030 - Information and communication;

Keywords

food security

global climate change

climate shocks

ndvi

mental model

sustainability science

Goals / Objectives
This proposal aims to conduct transdisciplinary research leading to the development of a framework to assess the potential impacts of climate change on food security within the United States and applied in Vermont. The proposal willassess the ways in which climate change impacts food security through a food systems framework using a multi-faceted approach, first aiming to understand the relationship between food security and climate factors as well as other factors critical to a functioning food system that may be affected by climate change, then conducting a social media analysis of how US residents communicate about food surrounding climate shocks, and finally to utilize mental models through an interview process with residents in Vermont. This multi-scaled approach enables utilization of several forms of data across the ecological, social, computer, and p sciences to develop a robust framework to assess the climate-food security relationship using quantitative and qualitative methods.The approach recognizes the global nature of our food system and considers Vermont's vulnerability to climate change in the same context as other parts of the globe through a multi-faceted research approach using data across scales (global, national, state) and approaches (quantitative, qualitative, modeling).Overall Project Goal: To assess the ways in which climate change impacts food security in the United States through a food systems framework. Specific objectives include:?1. To assess the factors in the food system that influence how climate (and change) are connected to food security globally across diverse contexts (urban, rural, developed, developing).2. To understand how US residents communicate about food during times of climate shocks.3: To assess the mental models of Vermonters related to food security and climate change4. To identify food system elements connecting climate change to food security outcomes in the United States to develop a framework to assess potential climate change impacts on food security

Project Methods
Objective 1: We will utilize the Gallup World Poll to access the relationships between climate elements, other factors related to food access, utilization and security, (described below), and food security. The Gallup World Poll is conducted in more than 160 countries, representing more than 98% of the world's adult population. Within these geographic regions there are also multiple jurisdictions at which sampling occurs. This is important in part because it demonstrates that the level of analysis can happen at sub-national levels. For example, for the first time ever, we can understand how food security is experienced in Vermont, U.S. as compared to Chikwawa, Malawi. Additional information on the sampling methodology of the poll is found in the Gallup World Poll Methodology (Gallup, 2015).In addition to the Gallup poll data we will utilize a number of climate variables to understand how climate, in conjunction with other factors, influence food security. We propose to use The Climate Hazards Group InfraRed Precipitation with Station data (CHIRPS) to simulate the variability of observed rainfall through time (Funk et al. 2015). The CHIRPS is a 30+ year, quasi-global rainfall dataset. Spanning 50°S-50°N and all longitudes, starting in 1981 to 2015, CHIRPS incorporates a 0.05° resolution climatology along with satellite imagery and in-situ station data to create gridded rainfall time series for trend analysis and seasonal drought monitoring (Funk et al. 2014). CHIRPS has a strong relationship with precipitation datasets such as the Global Precipitation Climatology Center data (Funk et al. 2003; Funk et al. 2015; Schneider et al. 2008), which is regarded as a very accurate estimate of precipitation. We will extract the CHIRPS monthly data from 1983 to 2013 and create a seasonal sum for each location in the Gallup Poll. We will use the pixel value corresponding with the geographic coordinates of the communities participating in the survey and average the rainfall data across each region, and then aggregate temporally to create annual sums.The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensors can be used to provide a measure of "greenness" or chlorophyll density (Brown et al. 2006). Vegetation data is useful for monitoring the condition of vegetation, particularly in arid and semi-arid rainfed agriculture and rangelands (Doraiswamy et al. 2007; Hobbs 1995; Rasmussen 1997). Here we use the annual NDVI from MODIS to estimate overall vegetation productivity in each community during the years of analysis.We propose to model food security as a function of a variety of factors including direct climate variables to understand the relationship between food security and predictor variables at a global scale. We will use a series of multilevel varying effects (hierarchical, mixed, random effects) models to look at the associations between food security, climate, and Gallup indicators as well as other potential country, state or county-level indicators from the Gallup poll (education, income, etc.) We will use multi-level logistic regression models that enable for varying household-level, county, state and country level varying intercepts to control for unobserved differences of outcomes shared within counties, states and countries (i.e. the fact that food security is variable in one country and region as compared to another due to a suite of factors not captured in the model variables) (McElreath 2015).Objective 2: We propose to utilize novel complex systems methods to provide data for the development of our framework in the United States by assessing tweets within the United States prior to, during and after extreme climate shocks to understand how people communicate about food. We will analyze tweets for content to better understand how and why people may experience acute food insecurities as a result of climate shocks. Through an agreement with the social media company Twitter, since 2008 our collaborators at UVM's Computational Story Lab receive 10% of all public messages and nearly 100% of geolocated messages. This dataset represents an archival collection of over 100 billion tweets which have revealed a number of insights into human behavior. In the present study, the aforementioned methodologies will be directed at extreme weather events (e.g. hurricanes, drought) over the prior decade. Social media activity during and following specific hurricanes such as Irene and Sandy and other major extreme events including droughts will be analyzed to understand the impact of climate shocks on the national and regional food systems. Word-shift graphs (University of Vermont 2014) will be used to reveal the texture of differences in discourse between regions and time periods. This analysis can provide valuable insight into the ways in which food systems and food security is disrupted prior to, during and after climate shocks.Objective 3: Using the combination of global, US and Vermont data from our Gallup models and Twitter we propose to combine this information with Vermont resident mental models of food security and climate change to understand how food security has been and will be affected by climate change and shocks. We will conduct pilot mental model interviews with 10-15 Vermont residents, policymakers, food bank employees, non-profit organizations, and agricultural producers to understand how these individuals perceive relationships between food production, food access, and food utilization and the proposed pathways of potential disruption and change from climate as determined through our previous methods and objectives. Mental models are based in fuzzy-logic cognitive mapping, which aim to understand how individuals perceive relationships between key components within systems (Gray et al. 2013). We will utilize the Mental Modeler software (www.mentalmodeler.org) to semi-quantitatively map individual perceptions of food security and climate change. We propose to utilize these interviews as a pilot to ground-test and refine our framework and to apply for additional funding to examine the framework in other parts of the US.We will conduct interviews across the state to capture both urban and rural components of the food system to determine how people of varying roles within the food system perceive food security and climate change. Collectively, these mental models will help to inform the development of our framework.Objective 4: Using the data of the aforementioned objectives, we will develop and refine a framework applicable to the United States especially, but also likely other developed regions, to map potential climate change impacts and impact pathways across the food systems, ultimately to influence food security. This type of work has been done extensively already in the developing world, often through a livelihoods framework or resilience framework (e.g. UN FAO 2008; Nelson et al. 2010). The Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS) program in affiliation with the CGIAR is focused extensively on smallholder farmer adaptation to climate change and food security. These are important to consider given the prevalence of food insecurity among smallholders (Brown and Funk 2008); however, there has been very little work to consider climate impacts on food security in the developed world and especially far removed from smallholder farming. We will develop a framework for the United States to map flows, impacts and feedbacks between food access, availability, and utilization and climate change. We intend to further apply and refine this framework across other regions of the United States through other future planned grant proposals.

Progress 10/01/16 to 09/30/20

Outputs
Target Audience:Target audiences for this work have included multiple groups from the global to local scale. Academic manuscripts have contributed to the scholarly literature, but the project has also produced briefs that were distributed to farmers and Cooperative Extension as well as agricultural advisors. Furthermore, the project has directly resulted in collaborations across institutions as well as presentations to a wide array of policymakers and academics through the National Academies of Sciences for example. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?In total, the project supported collaborations across disciplines and departments, including between the PI and four other faculty at UVM, in two different departments. Furthermore, it supported broadening collaborations for the PI with researchers at The University of Maryland and UC Davis. Finally, the project has built capacity and training for four UVM graduate students and one UVM undergraduate student. It has demonstrated that multiple impacts and complex relationships of climate, and climate change, on food security and nutritional outcomes. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The results of the academic papers have been primarily distributed via open access publications, to ensure publicly available research. Further, the brief was made open access and distributed via Cooperative Extension and agricultural networks within the US and beyond. Finally, the University of Vermont conducted press releases, which were then picked up by multiple media outlets. A recent paper, exploring climate change and diet diversity impacts was highlighted globally in media. Below are several examples: Climate impact on childhood diet may undermine food security efforts ByDonna Lu Meredith Niles at theUniversity of Vermontand her colleagues analysed the results of health surveys from more than 107,000 children in 19 countries - in Asia; North, south-east and West Africa; and Central and South America. The surveys were conducted between 2005 and 2009. New Scientist Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. MSN Reuters https://www.reuters.com/article/global-climate-food/scientists-warn-climate-change-is-harming-childrens-diets-idUSL8N2JO4P4?edition-redirect=uk Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. Outlet Daily Mail Climate Change Pushing Up Child Malnutrition Levels, Finds 19-Country Study ByDisha Shetty The results of the study by researchers at theUniversity of Vermontwas published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Research Letters. The 19-country study is one of the largest such studies looking at the relationship between climate change and malnutrition. Forbes Climate change is leaving children with less to eat ByEmma Gatten The study from researchers at theUniversity of Vermontlooked at diet diversity, a metric of nutrition which calculates the number of food groups eaten over a specific time period. The Telegraph Rising temperatures linked to poorer diets for children, says global study ByDaisy Dunne Dr Meredith Niles, an assistant professor in nutrition at theUniversity of Vermontand lead author of the study published in Environmental Research Letters, told The Independent: "Climate has significant relationships with diet diversity outcomes among children. Outlet The Independent Climate Change Is Spurring Malnutrition in Kids Worldwide ByRobert Preidt Warmer temperatures now equal or exceed the impact of traditional causes of child malnutrition and low quality diets, such as poverty, poor sanitation and low levels of education, according to investigators from theUniversity of Vermont. Outlet U.S. News & World Report Climate change could have a 'profound' negative impact on child malnourishment ByAyesha Tandon Dr Meredith Niles, assistant professor in the department of nutrition and food sciences at theUniversity of Vermontand lead author of the study, explains to Carbon Brief why malnutrition is particularly damaging for the young: "Children are uniquely vulnerable and at risk from malnutrition because Carbon Brief EcoWatch https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change-children-food-2649952919.html?rebelltitem=4#rebelltitem4 Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. Yahoo Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. Yahoo Singapore https://au.news.yahoo.com/climate-change-worsens-child-malnutrition-120007502.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/climate-change-worsens-child-malnutrition-120007779.html Climate Change Is Spurring Malnutrition in Kids Worldwide ByRobert Preidt Warmer temperatures now equal or exceed the impact of traditional causes of child malnutrition and low quality diets, such as poverty, poor sanitation and low levels of education, according to investigators from theUniversity of Vermont. Outlet HealthDay Climate Change Worsens Child Malnutrition: Study ByPatrick Galey A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. Outlet International Business Times (U.S.) Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study ByMegan McLaughlin A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. "Continued environmental degradation has the potential to undermine the impressive global health gains of the last 50 years. France 24 Climate change worsens child malnutrition: study A team of researchers led by theUniversity of Vermontexamined diet diversity among more than 100,000 under-fives in 19 low-income countries across Asia, Africa and South America. They then combined this with 30 years of temperature and precipitation data. ... "That is something we find again and again in this global research," said co-author Taylor Ricketts, director of theUniversity of Vermont'sGund Institute for Environment. "Continued environmental degradation has the potential to undermine the impressive global health gains of the last 50 years." Bangkok Post Climate change is hurting children's diets, global study finds: Rising temperatures contribute to child malnutrition and reduced diet quality "Certainly, future climate changes have been predicted to affect malnutrition, but it surprised us that higher temperatures are already showing an impact," said lead author Meredith Niles, an assistant professor of Nutrition and Food Sciences at theUniversity of Vermontand a fellow at the university's ... "Diet diversity was already low for this group," saidUVMco-author Brendan Fisher. "These results suggest that, if we don't adapt, climate change could further erode a diet that already isn't meeting adequate child micronutrient levels." Outlet ScienceDaily What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? Nothing Reported

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? At the global scale, this project has supported work with Dr. Molly E. Brown and Dr. Matthew Cooper at The University of Maryland, to examine the academic literature on food security over time to determine the themes and geographic locations of existing research. This paper, "Text mining the food security literature reveals substantial spatial bias and thematic broadening over time", is currently in revision at Global Food Security. Utilizing network analysis and other spatial and computational tools, we demonstrate that the existing food security literature broadly aggregates around the four pillars of food security (availability, accessibility, utilization, and stability) with some stand-alone key themes. Further, we demonstrate significant spatial bias, with existing literature more prevalent in some regions than others, which does not track with food insecurity prevalence. At the cross-country scale, two notable works has resulted from this project. The first, in collaboration with two former graduate students, Dr. Brendan Fisher (UVM), Dr. Taylor Ricketts (UVM), and Dr. Molly E. Brown (University of Maryland), links 30 years of climate data with household level data on childhood diet diversity outcomes. This work is currently under review for a special issue in sustainable food systems at Environmental Research Letters. This work was the first to link diet diversity data for children five and under from 19 countries with 30 years of climate data (temperature and precipitation) at the household scale. While there is a growing body of work examining the links between climate and diet/nutritional outcomes, this has not been done across multiple regions and countries generally speaking (Phalkey et al 2015). Our work advances this understanding by including data from six regions and both temperature and precipitation data, the former being currently understudied. We demonstrate that globally, higher long-term temperatures are associated with decreases in overall child diet diversity, while higher rainfall in the previous year, compared to the long-term average is associated with greater diet diversity. We also find that five out of six regions have significant reductions in diet diversity associated with higher temperatures, while three have significant increases in diet diversity associated with higher precipitation. Importantly, our models also utilize agroecological, geographic, socioeconomic and demographic controls to examine the relative effect of climate outcomes as compared to these other factors. In many regions, we find that the statistical effect of climate on child diet diversity is comparable or greater than these controls, including many that are common for development efforts including education, improved water and toilets, and poverty reduction. Across Sub-Saharan Africa, research was conducted with a distinguished undergraduate research student and examined the relationship between financial resources, gender, and food security among smallholder farmers in four regions in Sub-Saharan Africa. The work, published in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems in 2019 (Carranza and Niles 2019), demonstrated that women in these regions did not seek financial credit at different rates than men, but were less likely to obtain formal loans from banks or the government (important for the potential size of a loan among other reasons). Furthermore, we found that while both men and women were spending their credit on food, women were more likely to spend their credit on education and medical expenses while men were more likely to spend their credit on agricultural inputs and livestock. These spending differences we discuss in the context of climate change adaptation, where different credit priorities could lead to differences in adaptive capacity. In the United States, Twitter data assessed how people in the US discussed food during extreme climate events. In collaboration with Dr. Chris Danforth (UVM) and Dr. Peter Dodds (UVM), as well as two former graduate students in Data Science and Complex Systems, we explored Twitter data from a week before and after five of the most costly US natural hazards in recent years. This work demonstrated that individual people are the most important for information sharing during natural hazard events, and that people use Twitter in different timeframes depending on the type of event (e.g. prior to a hurricane for preparation tweets). We also demonstrated numerous examples of food security and food-related increases in tweets. This work was published in PLOS One in 2019 (Niles et al 2019), and received national media attention, as well as contributed to the master's work of a student in Complex Systems and Data Science at UVM. Finally, in Vermont, this project integrated with my existing USDA grant on developing climate change adaptation resources for New England farmers to understand farmer's mental models of climate, farm systems and food production. Ensuring food security in a changing climate will require that farmers adopt new practices and implement adaptation strategies to safeguard food production. Furthermore, it requires that agricultural advisors, such as Cooperative Extension, agricultural industry, and scientists, who provide resources and information to farmers, have an understanding of farmer's needs. This work interviewed 49 farmers and agricultural advisors in Maine and Vermont to assess their climate change perceptions, resource needs, and farm and climate mental models. Mental models are the ways that people view various components of a system, and their connectedness, in their minds. In this project, we used mental models of farmers and agricultural advisors to assess whether these two groups perceived climate change and farm systems differently. We found that farmers were much more likely to consider community well-being and the environment in their farm systems than agricultural advisors thought farmers did. The HATCH grant partially supported a former UVM food systems master's student. The work resulted in a public brief, "What do Northern New England Farmers Need to Adapt to Climate Change?", which was shared broadly by Cooperative Extension, the USDA Climate Hub, and UVM with agricultural advisors and farmers. As well, a manuscript, 'Informing Agricultural Climate Change Outreach through Mental Modelling" the work is currently being finalized for publication. All told, the previous HATCH grant has led to considerable outcomes and key results. It has resulted in six peer-reviewed publications and one research brief distributed through Cooperative Extension. Furthermore, it resulted in three separate presentations on the topic at the National Academies of Sciences and Medicine. These results were generated using mixed methods, ranging from complex systems and data science, interdisciplinary data integration, interviews, mental models, and text mining.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Carranza, M., and M.T. Niles. (2019). Smallholder farmers spend credit primarily on food: gender differences and foodsecurity implications in a changing climate. Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems. 3:56. doi:10.3389/fsufs.2019.00056
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Niles, M.T., Emery, B.F., Reagan, A., Dodds, P.S., Danforth, C. (2019). Social media usage patterns during naturalhazards. PLOS ONE. 14(2): e0210484. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0210484
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2021 Citation: Niles M.T., Emery, B.F. , Wiltshire, S., Fischer, B., Ricketts, T., Brown, M. (2021). Climate effects on child diet diversity across low and middle-income countries. Environmental Research Letters. 16: 015010. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/abd0ab
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2020 Citation: Cooper, M., Brown. M.E., Niles, M.T., Mahmoud, M. (2020). Text mining the food security literature reveals substantial spatial bias and thematic broadening over time. Global Food Security. 26, 100392. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gfs.2020.100392
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2021 Citation: Niles, M.T., Rudnick, J., Lubell, M. Linking Household and Community Social Capital to Smallholder Food Security. Accepted at Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems.
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Under Review Year Published: 2021 Citation: Nicholson, C., Emery, B.F. , Niles, M.T. Global relationships between crop diversity and nutritional stability. In Review at Nature Communications. PrePrint: https://biorxiv.org/cgi/content/short/2020.07.29.227520v1
• Type: Other Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Johnson, D., Niles, M.T., Wentworth, T., Faulkner, J., Birthisel, S., Clements, R. 2019. What do Northern New England Farmers Need to Adapt to Climate Change? https://womeninag.extension.org/resource/what-do-northern-new-england-farmers-need-to-adapt-to-climate-change/
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2018 Citation: Invited Speaker. November 2018. Food and Nutrition Board- National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. Washington D.C. Environmental Warming and its Implications for Food Policy.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2019 Citation: 6) Invited Panelist. December 2019. Meeting of Experts on Emerging Issues in Climate Change and Human Health. National Academies of Sciences, Medicine and Engineering. Washington DC. Food Security and Climate Change as part of the panel on Food and Water in a Changing Climate.
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Other Year Published: 2021 Citation: 1) Invited Panelist. April 2021. 2020 National Academy of Medicine Emerging Leaders Forum. National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. Washington DC. Food systems and food security in a changing climate as part of the panel The Evolution of the Research Enterprise in Response to Climate Change.

Progress 10/01/18 to 09/30/19

Outputs
Target Audience:Published research was targeted towards a general audience, as well as people specifically working in disaster and emergency recovery. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?The project worked with three graduate students in the past year, as well as one professional technical assistant. These students were trained in mental modelling software and practice, and interviewing skills, data science and computer science analysis, and data visualization. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?We have shared our manuscripts through an open access process. In addition, our one manuscript was covered through The University of Vermont in a press release, which received multiple media coverage. We also put together a brief related to the mental modelling outcomes of our work with farmers, which was shared via Cooperative extension at University of Vermont. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?We will finalize our global analysis on food security and climate change, and continue to make progress on a paper that explores links between nutritional stability over time and crop diversity, utilizing a food systems and climate framework.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? We have published 2 papers now to achieve our first two goals (with additional manuscripts in the works). In addition, we completed mental model interviews with Vermonters to assess their perspectives on climate change and food security, amongst other topics. We are continuing to write additional manuscripts and finalize research efforts and outreach.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Niles, M.T., Emery, B.F., Reagan, A., Dodds, P.S., Danforth, C. (2019). Social media usage patterns during natural hazards. PLOS ONE. 14(2): e0210484. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0210484
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Carranza, M., and M.T. Niles. (2019). Smallholder farmers spend credit primarily on food: gender differences and food security implications in a changing climate. Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems. 3:56. doi:10.3389/fsufs.2019.00056
• Type: Other Status: Other Year Published: 2018 Citation: Presentation to the Food and Nutrition Board- National Academies of Sciences, Medicine and Engineering. Washington D.C. Environmental Warming and its Implications for Food Policy.

Progress 10/01/17 to 09/30/18

Outputs
Target Audience:Target audiences have included academics and non-academics via peer-reviewed publications. This includes media (a press release was written on one of our articles), as well as a blog overview that was shared with non-academics and stakeholders in the field. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?The project has enabled the integration of master's and PhD students into the analysis and research. Furthermore, it has allowed hiring of a research assistant, who is a young professional. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The university wrote a press release about our article that is in press currently, and will be covered by various news outlets. We are planning additional novel outcomes to communicate the work outcomes of our work objectives when they are finished. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?We are working to finalize the data analysis and research for the other components, and plan to achieve this within the coming year.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Thus far we have gathered data and analyzed it for objective 1 above. This has included aggregating climate and survey data from 30 years, not an easy task! We are now in the process of putting together models. For objective 2, we have explored this and published an article in 2019 in PLOS One, which also received media attention. Objective 3 is underway currently. We are using the results of our existing outcomes to inform objective 4.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Niles, M.T., Emery, B.F ., Reagan, A., Dodds, P.S., Danforth, C. (2019). Average individuals tweet more often during extreme events: An ideal mechanism for social contagion. In Press at PLOS ONE. Preprint: arXiv:1806.07451v2

Progress 10/01/16 to 09/30/17

Outputs
Target Audience:The first year of our project was largely focused on data acquisition, data analysis, and results interpretation. We have successfully aggregated data across 49 countries utilizing the Demographic Health Surveys from USAID. Collectively, this is nearly 800,000 households. We have combined this data with 30 years of rainfall, temperature and NDVI data to be able to analyze diet and food security data against climate data. Given the significant size of this dataset, it has been an undertaking to aggregate this data. Progress is also made on the second goal exploring the social media and twitter in the context of extreme events and food security. Thus, at this point, our work has not yet reached a target audience, but the goal target audience is for policymakers and development organizations as well as disaster relief organizations and domestic policymakers. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Nothing Reported How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Nothing Reported What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?For goal 1, we will begin analysis of data to answer our questions and write up our results. We will finalize data analysis for the twitter analysis, write up our results and publish them. And, within the coming year we will begin to identify individuals to interview in Vermont and begin to develop our framework.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? 1. To assess the factors in the food system that influence how climate (and change) are connected to food security globally across diverse contexts (urban, rural, developed, developing). We successfully obtained data from the USAID Demographic Health Surveys (DHS) across 49 countries totalling nearly 800,000 households across 14 years. In addition, we aggregated 30 years of climate data and NDVI data coordinated with the GPS coordinates of the households. 2. To understand how US residents communicate about food during times of climate shocks. We are nearing the completion of this component of the project, successfully analyzing tweets from the top five disasters in the U.S. in the last 10 years. We have been able to explore how people communicate about food and food security during disaster events (before, during and after). We are in the final process of analyzing our results and beginning to write up our results for publication.

Publications