The Center on Food Security and the Environment is a joint effort of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.
Scholarly Publications
Two shifts for crop mapping: Leveraging aggregate crop statistics to improve satellite-based maps in new regions
Crop type mapping at the field level is critical for a variety of applications in agricultural monitoring, and satellite imagery is becoming an increasingly abundant and useful raw input from which...
Cleaner air has contributed one-fifth of US maize and soybean yield gains since 1999
Crop productivity is potentially affected by several air pollutants, although these are usually studied in isolation. A significant challenge to understanding the effects of multiple pollutants in...
Historical warming has increased U.S. crop insurance losses
Quantification of the sector-specific financial impacts of historical global warming represents a critical gap in climate change impacts assessment. The multiple decades of county-level data...
Other Publications
The Future of Food from the Sea
November 2019
As the global population and people’s incomes rise, the demand for ocean-derived food will continue to grow.
News
Stanford researchers offer practical tips to mitigate harm from wildfire smoke
July 2021
Warnings of another severe wildfire season abound, as do efforts to reduce the risk of ignition. Yet few are taking precautions against the smoke. Stanford experts advise on contending with hazardous...
Cleaner air has boosted U.S. corn and soybean yields, Stanford-led research shows
July 2021
The analysis estimates pollution reductions between 1999 and 2019 contributed to about 20 percent of the increase in corn and soybean yield gains during that period – an amount worth about $5 billion...
Events
Innovation Needed to Meet Global Food Security Challenges
January 30, 2020
Join us for a talk with agricultural and development economist Christopher B. Barrett, this quarter’s visiting scholar with the Center on Food Security and the Environment.
Global Food Security Symposium Series | India's Transition: Was Coleridge Right?
November 8, 2019
...water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink...Join Stanford's Center on Food Security and the Environment for a lecture and reception with Dr.
A Conversation with David Beasley: Challenges of 21st Century Humanitarian Response
September 10, 2019
Please join us for a conversation with United Nations World Food Programme Executive Director David Beasley, who will discuss "Challenges of 21st Century Humanitarian Response." The conversation...
Projects
Global Food Security Symposium Series
The Global Food Security Symposium series brings leading experts in food security areas including agriculture, policy, development, and technology to Stanford to share new research in an integrated...
English
Rules and tools for the econometric analysis of geocoded data
The increasing availability of high resolution geocoded data on key outcomes (e.g. incomes) and potential drivers of these outcomes (e.g.
English
Remote sensing approaches to improving aid targeting and understanding aid effectiveness
This project aims to develop and test remote-sensing based approaches to gathering two typesof aid-relevant data: data on agricultural productivity and data on household assets, with a focus on Sub...
English
Multimedia
Clean air led to better crop yields, Stanford researchers find
July 2021
Reductions in air pollution led to significant increases in corn and soybean yields from 1999-2019, according to new Stanford research that uses satellite data to measure pollution at fine scales. Read more at woods.stanford.edu.
Housing markets don't efficiently factor in flood risk, researchers find
April 2021
As the climate changes, more frequent and intense flooding is a threat that many Americans face. In a new study, Stanford researchers explored whether US housing markets respond efficiently to information about flood risk.
Stanford-led analysis reveals aquaculture's promise and peril
March 2021
A Stanford-led team of researchers conducted a review on the past 20 years of global aquaculture, finding that freshwater aquaculture has grown dramatically and feeds have become more sustainable.
People
Rosamond L. Naylor Senior Fellow William Wrigley Professor of Earth System Science, Senior Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute and Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Senior Fellow and Founding Director, Center on Food Security and the Environment 
Noah Diffenbaugh Kara J. Foundation Professor and Kimmelman Family Senior Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment 
Steven Gorelick Cyrus F. Tolman Professor and Senior Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment 
Stefano Ermon Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment 
Matthieu Stigler Postdoctoral Scholar, Center on Food Security and the Environment, Department of Earth System Science 
Jillian Deines Postdoctoral Scholar, Center on Food Security and the Environment, Department of Earth System Science 
A. Patrick Behrer Postdoctoral Scholar, Center on Food Security and the Environment, Department of Earth System Science