From the COVID-19 pandemic to geopolitical conflicts, and catastrophic steering failures on cargo ships, as reported by NPR and The New York Times, the world has seen how a weak link in a supply chain can have far-reaching consequences for businesses and livelihoods, restricting consumer access to everything from food staples to essential manufacturing components.  

A less publicized but dangerous disruptor of supply chains is presenting a growing and consistent threat: climate change. It is already impacting the food systems we need to live. Food supply chains are especially vulnerable as they depend on natural resources and global weather patterns to match supply and demand, locally and abroad. Disruptions in one part of the world can cut off access to critical food staples in others. 

Extreme weather events such as droughts, heatwaves, storms, and floods are damaging crops and harming livestock and fisheries. Reuters reports that such events have increased in frequency and severity: The last decade has seen the hottest years on record. According to the World Bank Group, seasons with below-average rainfall have become twice as common in some regions over the last 50 years, and the NASA Earth Observatory reports that the proportion of the world’s population exposed to floods has risen by 20-24 percent since 2000. The resulting loss of revenue from damaged or spoiled crops takes an extra toll on small and midsized farms, which often operate on thin financial margins and are unable to absorb even small financial setbacks. 

Food that successfully leaves the farm remains vulnerable to climate change disruptions in transit, much of which is long-distance. For example, maritime shipping, as reported by OECD, transports 90 percent of food imports and exports worldwide. A disruption to any heavily used shipping route can have a disproportionate impact on global food systems. Longer alternative routes require more staff time and fuel, driving up costs and carbon footprints. Perishable foods that spend more time in transit are more likely to spoil, causing financial loss for producers and retailers and reduced availability of products for consumers. Furthermore, delayed shipments contribute to climate change if spoiled food ends up in a landfill and releases methane, a greenhouse gas that traps much more heat than carbon dioxide, according to the Climate Portal.

The good news is that philanthropists can play a crucial role in making food supply chains more resilient to climate-related disruptions by supporting new technology, data collection, policies, infrastructure, and markets. Philanthropy can catalyze initiatives in nimble ways that private markets often cannot. While other sectors may be limited in their scope by politics or shareholder obligations, philanthropists can have more discretion and control over their funds. Foundations can provide the initial capital needed to de-risk investments in new projects and attract further funding from traditional investors. Based on interviews with experts and desk research conducted by Milken Institute staff, here are six recommendations for philanthropists who want to help build resilient food supply chains: 

1. Provide grants, low-interest loans, and de-risking catalytic capital to help farmers invest in adaptation and mitigation strategies. These strategies may include growing more resilient and diverse crops, using technology such as precision agriculture to improve operational efficiency and reduce crop loss, and improving cold storage to enable the sale of excess crop yields off-season. 

2. Improve data collection in emerging economies, where farming communities are the source of many food supply chains. Supporting data collection in these areas offers additional benefits such as training and employing local youth for data collection, enabling access to international sustainability certifications, and in areas that are ripe for mitigation and adaptation solutions. 

3. Provide financial support to facilitate transitions to regenerative agricultural practices, which can increase on-farm resiliency and enable farmers to participate in food markets focused on sustainability.

4. Support decarbonized shipping infrastructure across international supply chains, such as the use of zero-emission vessels, specialized ports to service those vessels, and policies to incentivize their creation.

5. Catalyze and de-risk processing infrastructure, such as new regional processing plants, to support farmers’ access to local and regional supply chains and lower the carbon costs of transporting food. Philanthropic capital can catalyze such investments by subsidizing the construction, materials, training, and certification costs, opening the door to larger private investments.

6. Using philanthropic capital to establish a model for public capital to further support the development and implementation of these policies, leveraging tools such as social impact bonds or loan guarantees.

Resilient supply chains stand to benefit all sectors, including food, medicine, equipment, and other essential supplies, all of which depend on reliable production and transportation. Ignoring the growing threat of climate-related disruptions to supply chains puts governments, businesses, and the communities they serve at risk. Philanthropists can contribute to progress on climate action in every sector by supporting supply chain resiliency efforts. Furthermore, “supply chain resiliency” need not include the word “climate,” serving as a more neutral focal point in places like the United States where climate action is often politicized. While climate change poses many challenges to global supply chains, philanthropic investments that increase their resiliency can help prepare societies to meet the nutritional, economic, and environmental demands of the near future.