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    Showing 9 of 96 news items in Water & Food
    Azores Begins Cattle Testing Over Health Fears Surrounding Heavy Metal Pollution Around Lajes Air Base
    Water & FoodAugust 6, 2026

    Azores Begins Cattle Testing Over Health Fears Surrounding Heavy Metal Pollution Around Lajes Air Base

    The Azores Regional Government is launching an independent investigation into decades of soil and groundwater contamination linked to Lajes Air Base on Terceira Island. Authorities will map fuel-contamination plumes and test cattle, pasture and water near affected areas, with separate analysis of milk because of the island's major dairy sector. The testing will cover hydrocarbons, heavy metals, PFAS and BTEX compounds, while a proposed independent technical commission is expected to review studies, commission further analyses and report on environmental and public-health measures.

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    Reimagining Water and Resilience on a Greek Island in the Aegean Sea
    Water & FoodAugust 6, 2026

    Reimagining Water and Resilience on a Greek Island in the Aegean Sea

    Skiathos is becoming a resilience hub through the EU-funded NURISH project, which is preparing nature-based responses to water scarcity, wildfire and flood risk. Planned interventions include constructed wetlands combined with photovoltaic systems to treat and reuse urban wastewater, as well as systems to capture and store rainfall and flood runoff for firefighting and agriculture. The project aims to turn a cycle of seasonal water shortage and increasingly intense rainfall into a regenerative local water system, with implementation scheduled for 2027.

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    Food Supply Chain Investments: A New Beginning for Caribbean Agriculture?
    Water & FoodAugust 6, 2026

    Food Supply Chain Investments: A New Beginning for Caribbean Agriculture?

    Caribbean countries remain heavily dependent on imported staple foods despite producing export crops, while a 2025 survey found 42% of people in the English- and Dutch-speaking Caribbean were food insecure. Investment in controlled-environment agriculture, such as container farms and high-tech greenhouses, could increase reliable local production in limited space and reduce exposure to hurricanes, drought and flooding. Regional supply-chain development is also being pursued through a planned modern sugar refinery in Belize, intended to process Caribbean cane for local manufacturers and meet more than 75% of Caricom's refined-sugar needs.

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    Partners Launch PacFresH2O to Strengthen Climate-Resilient Water Security in the Pacific
    Water & FoodJuly 30, 2026

    Partners Launch PacFresH2O to Strengthen Climate-Resilient Water Security in the Pacific

    Governments and development partners have launched PacFresH2O in Port Moresby to strengthen climate-resilient freshwater, sanitation and hygiene systems in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands. The five-year programme is supported by Germany's International Climate Initiative and co-implemented by GIZ, the Pacific Community, WaterAid Papua New Guinea and Live & Learn Solomon Islands. It combines infrastructure with stronger institutions, coordination and long-term water-service sustainability in two Pacific island countries facing growing climate pressures.

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    On Greek Island of Santorini, Winemakers Try to Adapt to Heat and Drought
    Water & FoodJuly 23, 2026

    On Greek Island of Santorini, Winemakers Try to Adapt to Heat and Drought

    Successive years of heat and low rainfall have damaged Santorini's historic vineyards, reduced wine production and intensified concern over water security. Growers are adapting while protecting the island's distinctive winemaking traditions. At Domaine Sigalas, trials include using treated wastewater from homes and hotels for irrigation, planting vines in rows to improve water efficiency, and harvesting atmospheric moisture with solar-powered systems. The work illustrates how island food systems and cultural landscapes are responding to increasingly erratic climate conditions.

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    From an Island to Shelves Around the World: the Story of Azorean Canned Fish
    Water & FoodJuly 14, 2026

    From an Island to Shelves Around the World: the Story of Azorean Canned Fish

    The island of Terceira in the Azores lies 1,500 km west of mainland Portugal, remote enough to make running a business complicated, let alone one built on delivering fresh fish to distant markets. Tibério Barbeito started TZT Flying Fish Azores in his twenties with exactly that ambition. Ten years later, with EU funding behind him, he has revived Terceira's canning industry, turning locally caught fish into gourmet canned products. He began experimenting with cold-smoking local fish species, then diversified into canning with support from Grater, the Fisheries Local Action Group. His canned products, sold under the brand Casa do Portinho, use fresh fish landed by the local fleet, including horse mackerel, Atlantic bonito, limpets, ray and barracuda.

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    Svalbard Global Seed Vault, Princess of Asturias Award for International Cooperation 2026
    Water & FoodJune 25, 2026

    Svalbard Global Seed Vault, Princess of Asturias Award for International Cooperation 2026

    The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway has been granted the 2026 Princess of Asturias Award for International Cooperation, as announced today by the Jury responsible for conferring said Award. Convened by the Princess of Asturias Foundation, the Jury for this Award was chaired by Gustavo Suarez-Pertierra and composed of several members. This candidature was put forward by Manuel Toharia Cortes, Jury member for the 2026 Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is an underground seed bank located on the island of Spitsbergen, in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard. Opened in 2008, it occupies an area of more than a thousand square metres, spread over three warehouses. Its goal is to safeguard the diversity of crop seeds in order to guarantee future supply in case of loss due to natural disasters, human conflicts, policy changes, mismanagement or any other circumstance. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is owned and administered by the Ministry of Agriculture and Food on behalf of the Kingdom of Norway. The Nordic Genetic Resources Center (NordGen) operates the facility and maintains a public online database of samples stored in the Vault. The Crop Trust provides financial support for Seed Vault operations and seed deposits from developing countries. Former Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon described the Vault as a "global insurance policy" and a "gift to humanity and a symbol of peace" during a visit to Svalbard in 2009. With a humanitarian purpose, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault is part of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) international system for the conservation of plant genetic resources.

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    Healthy islands and islanders: Towards a new paradigm for integrating climate change, food security and nutrition in Small Island Developing States
    Water & FoodApril 8, 2026

    Healthy islands and islanders: Towards a new paradigm for integrating climate change, food security and nutrition in Small Island Developing States

    Excerpt from odi.org As climate change intensifies, small island nations are facing growing threats to their food security. This policy brief from the Resilient and Sustainable Islands Initiative (RESI) looks at how climate, food, and policy are often treated separately, and why that needs to change. It highlights the unique pressures shaping island food systems and sets out a roadmap for more joined-up thinking, investment, and action.

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    Cli­mate resi­li­ence and inclus­ive water access in Jamaica
    Water & FoodApril 1, 2026

    Cli­mate resi­li­ence and inclus­ive water access in Jamaica

    Excerpt from pressreader.com THROUGHOUT THE mid-20th cen­tury to the present, one of the fore­most global issues has been that of cli­mate change and its com­pound­ing impacts on the global pop­u­lus. Due to global warm­ing, modi­fic­a­tions in weather pat­terns have res­ul­ted in increased extreme weather events, unpre­dict­able water avail­ab­il­ity, and increased water scarcity (UNICEF, 2024). In Jamaica, an intens­i­fic­a­tion of hydro­cli­matic vari­ab­il­ity across sea­sons is being observed, mani­fes­ted as a shift in the island’s tra­di­tional rain­fall pat­terns. Over recent years, pre­cip­it­a­tion events have been char­ac­ter­ised by unpre­dict­able, short-dur­a­tion, high-intens­ity storms, which gen­er­ate rapid sur­face run­off rather than infilt­ra­tion and ground­wa­ter recharge. Sim­il­arly, the occur­rence of drought has become increas­ingly peri­odic. Unpre­dict­able rain­fall has also meant longer dry spells, plunging Jamaica into drought-like con­di­tions for months at a time. Dur­ing an inter­view with Dr Arpita Man­dal, senior lec­turer at the Uni­versity of the West Indies, Mona, she stressed that “increases in drought-like con­di­tions affect all sec­tors across the island”. The per­petual impacts of cli­mate change on Jamaica’s sub­stand­ard water dis­tri­bu­tion net­work spe­cific­ally, however, deep­ens island­wide water inequity. Water inequity is the unequal access to water resources and ser­vices shaped by social, eco­nomic, polit­ical, and envir­on­mental dis­par­it­ies, affect­ing vul­ner­able groups (Sus­tain­ab­il­ity Dir­ect­ory, 2025). As unpre­dict­able rain­fall and droughts occur more habitu­ally, impacts on water resources are inev­it­able, neces­sit­at­ing resi­li­ent and equit­able water-man­age­ment solu­tions for groups facing unique vul­ner­ab­il­it­ies.

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