From promises to action: Analyzing global commitments to tackle hunger and food insecurity

Abstract

High-level declarations and commitment statements are a common output of global, intergovernmental meetings and critical to their continued public legitimacy. Yet, to what extent have such statements served as roadmaps for concrete action? To address this question, this paper focuses on commitments to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2, which aims to end hunger, achieve food security, and promote sustainable agriculture by 2030. Using a structured framework with seven domains, we analyzed 148 intergovernmental commitment documents emerging from 78 global meetings focused on SDG2 and organized by ten different global bodies between 2015 and 2023.

We find that stated visions to address SDG2 increasingly have been emphasized at global meetings over time but that specific actions to accelerate progress towards SDG2 were weaker. For instance, we find few examples of how needed actions will be scaled up over time, how financing might be mobilized, and how to strengthen horizontal (i.e. multi-sectoral) and vertical (i.e. multi-level) policy coherence. Progress reports are often identified as the main tool for providing public accountability, but there rarely are any consequences to governments for failure to uphold their commitments. We offer several policy recommendations emanating from the analysis, including the need to institutionalize monitoring of SDG2 commitments—not just targets—in the next five years, and a better understanding of political economy factors that may inhibit global decisions from translating into national policy decisions.