GAIN Marks World MSME Day 2026

22 June 2026- 27 June 2026Global

Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises are essential to the food systems people rely on every day. They grow, process, transport, market, and sell nutritious foods helping make healthier diets more available, affordable, and accessible. This World MSME Day, GAIN is spotlighting the MSMEs, entrepreneurs, partners, and employers shaping stronger food systems and healthier communities.

Strengthening Family-Led Business Governance: Lessons from Two N3F African Poultry Portfolio SMEs

Across Sub-Saharan Africa, most SMEs producing nutritious foods are family-owned enterprises. Often built from modest beginnings, these businesses play an important role in food systems by creating jobs, supporting rural economies, and expanding access to safe and affordable nutritious foods. As these companies grow, the demands for strengthening and streamlining their corporate governance and management structures increase significantly.

Integrating Nutrition Into Occupational Chemical Safety Standards

- 21/05/2026

The health effects of chemical exposure depend not only on the hazard itself, but also on the body’s capacity to defend, adapt, and recover. This varies between individuals and is strongly shaped by nutritional status, making nutrition a foundational determinant of occupational health risk. Adequate nutrition supports immune function, metabolic regulation, tissue repair, and detoxification processes. Sufficient energy, protein, essential minerals, micronutrients, and antioxidants are required for the body to maintain physiological stability and respond effectively to harmful substances. When these nutritional needs are met, workers are better equipped to withstand and recover from ongoing occupational exposures.

Nourishing Progress: Three Years of Action on WHA76.19. Accelerating Efforts to Prevent Micronutrient Deficiencies and Their Consequences Through Safe and Effective Food Fortification

- 15/05/2026

In May 2023, every Member State at the World Health Assembly resolved to accelerate safe and effective foodfortification. Nourishing Progress highlights meaningful progress, growing momentum and emerging opportunities since the resolution's adoption, and the growing coalition of governments, industry, patient associations, and health professionals driving this agenda forward. Anchored in a landmark Lancet Global Health analysis modeling the current and potential impact of large-scale food fortification programs, the report celebrates the progress made since the 2023 WHA resolution and outlines the growing global momentum towards transformative impact.

Beyond Safety Gear: Nutrition Protects Workers

- 14/05/2026

Chemical exposure is a growing occupational health concern as industrialization and technological change increase workers’ contact with hazardous substances. While occupational safety and health frameworks focus on managing exposure, they do not fully address chemicals that accumulate in the body and weaken immune function. Chemical exposure and poor nutrition can reinforce each other, increasing vulnerability to illness Integrating workforce nutrition into chemical risk management strengthens resilience, supports immunity, and provides an additional layer of protection for workers.

Accelerating Food Systems Transformation Across Asia - Key tools and selected cases

- 27/03/2026

This paper provides brief descriptions of eight key tools available to support national and sub-national transformation of food systems. Produced in advance of the Asia and the Pacific Food Systems Transformation Forum 2026, descriptions and cases provided focus on the Asia region.

Beyond One-Size-Fits-All: Developing Food Safety Guidelines Specific to the Needs of Traditional Markets

- 24/04/2026

Ensuring access to safe food is one of the core goals of food systems, yet millions of people worldwide get sick from unsafe food every year. This case study examines the development and adoption of international guidelines for food safety – specific to the traditional markets where many lower-income-country consumers buy their food. It shows how considering the needs and challenges of specific contexts when formulating guidelines or more formal policies can make for a more equitable enabling environment for food system transformation.

Adopting a Food Systems Approach to Reducing Hunger and Malnutrition: Lessons From Benin, DR Congo, and Madagascar

- 24/04/2026

Adopting food-related policies, governance approaches, and action plans that cut across sectors is key to food systems transformation – but how to do so is not always clear. This case study examines how policy stakeholders in three African countries were able to adopt food systems thinking, adapt their governance approaches to enable cross-sectoral food systems approaches, and start to move towards action.

GAIN Working Paper n°69: Supporting Nutrition to Foster Staff Wellbeing

- 20/04/2026

Many adults spend most of their waking hours at the workplace, making the latter a strategic, yet underappreciated, environment for health and well-being interventions. In the context of food systems, an impactful change that can be fostered through workplaces is improved nutrition through workforce nutrition (WFN) programmes. However, the process of gaining support for such programmes and the potential for having employers lead their design and uptake remain underexamined.