Food culture is often understood as the practices, beliefs, and traditions surrounding food and eating within a particular society or community. It encompasses various aspects of traditional dishes and recipes, culinary techniques and cooking methods, mealtime rituals, social aspects, and symbolism. Food culture in a critical factor shaping food choices by influencing eating and dietary norms and habitual behaviours. Given this, it is essential to clearly define the dimensions of food culture (particular to a country or region) if one is to seek to leverage its profound impact on individuals and communities. This working paper thus explores the multidimensional nature of food culture in India, emphasising its deep-rooted connections to cultural identity, social bonding, and wellbeing.
Addressing interlinked challenges related to nutrition, health, environmental sustainability, livelihoods, and economic growth requires integrated approaches that work across all aspects of food systems, as opposed to in sectoral silos. The 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) crystallised widespread agreement on the need for this kind of ‘food system transformation’ to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals and resulted in the establishment of over 100 country ‘food system pathways’ – guides for future transformation.
The website also contains the User's Manual for the tool, with additional guidance on how to apply the scoring and use the results.
THE OPPORTUNITY In Pakistan, where wheat is a daily staple, an invisible crisis is unfolding. Over 60 million people suffer from inadequate zinc intake, contributing to malnutrition and economic losses of nearly 3% of the country’s GDP. Zinc deficien cy plays a critical role in stunted growth among children, leading to impaired cognitive development that hampers learning abilities and future economic opportunities.
Indonesia’s 2025 update of its Food Security and Vulnerability Atlas (FSVA) marks a transformative leap in the nation’s
commitment to building a resilient, data-driven food system. While the FSVA has been updated annually in previous years, the 2025 edition introduces major innovations, including the use of village-level data for over 83,000 villages, expanded sub-district analysis, and the integration of new composite indicators and predictive modeling. These advances enable the more precise identification of food-insecure areas, supporting targeted actions aligned with national priorities, such as reducing stunting, alleviating poverty, and promoting rural development. With these enhancements, FSVA 2025 strengthens Indonesia’s capacity to deliver evidence-based, locally tailored
interventions across all levels of government.
The Nutrition for Growth (N4G) Summit 2025 is set to be a defining global event, providing a vital platform for countries to reaffirm and strengthen their commitments toward ending all forms of malnutrition. This summit holds global significance as it seeks to accelerate progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly goals related to nutrition, health, and sustainable food systems. For Indonesia, the 2025 Summit represents an opportunity to build upon and deepen its commitments from previous summits, specifically targeting persistent challenges such as stunting, wasting, obesity, and anemia, while reinforcing systemic integration of nutrition within broader health and social protection frameworks.
The world is facing multiple interconnected crises, including climate change and escalating conflicts, which pose significant challenges to food systems. These issues highlight the need for systemic transformation to improve food security, nutrition, and environmental sustainability. In response, GAIN's Nourishing Food Pathways (NFP) programme aims to strengthen and support the implementation of food system pathways in 11 countries.
One focus of NFP is exploring the intersection between food and environment, including climate change, to identify consumer actions that promote both nutrition and environmental sustainability in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Specifically, GAIN is interested in understanding if our Emotivate™ approach, which leverages emotions to motivate consumers to want better diets, can be extended to include emotions or values associated with environmental sustainability. Our initial hypothesis was that consumers felt emotional tensions related to environmental sustainability as a driver of food choices, which could be leveraged to develop an emotionally resonant campaign.
The food safety regulatory framework in Tanzania is characterized by the absence of a comprehensive, overarching policy framework dedicated solely to food safety. Instead, food safety governance is fragmented across various laws and regulations managed by different institutions each addressing specific aspects of food safety.
Adequate nutrition is essential for physical and cognitive development, improved health outcomes, and enhanced overall individual productivity, all of which contribute to broader macroeconomic and societal growth. However, malnutrition remains a pressing challenge, particularly in low- and medium-income countries, including Nigeria. Recent findings from the National Food Consumption and Micronutrient Survey reveal multiple forms of malnutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies.
This brief shares an analysis of trends in stunting and overweight among children under five – two of the six Global Nutrition Targets set by the World Health Assembly (WHA) for achievement by 2025 – in 12 focus countries.
WHA Global Nutrition Stunting Target 2012-2025
Achieve a 40% reduction in the number of children under-5 who are stunted
WHA Global Nutrition Overweight Target 2012-2025
Ensure that there is no increase in childhood overweight
