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By Anita Regmi, USDA Research, Education, and Economics

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from the USDA's rich science and research portfolio.

Living and traveling through rural South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, I have seen firsthand the challenges faced by many families as they strive to eke out a livelihood off a small, unyielding patch of land.  The difficulties faced by such families will only become more severe as climate change, population growth, and increased use of arable land to produce alternative uses for food such as biofuels erode food availability.

Today marks the release of the Feed the Future Initiative Guide during the Chicago Council of Global Affairs’ Symposium on Global Agriculture and Food Security. This guide lays out the implementation strategy for the U.S. government’s global hunger and food security initiative. USDA has been actively engaged in the development of the Feed the Future strategy from its inception and created an inter-departmental food security council that has contributed to the Feed the Future strategy and provided reviews of country investment plans.

I want to thank Avoided Deforestation Partners for holding this event and inviting me to join all of the distinguished speakers here today in urging the adoption of REDD plus as part of a global climate framework.

On Saturday, I arrived in the Philippines for the first-ever USDA trade mission in Southeast Asia. The Philippines is a key market in the region for U.S. agricultural exports, with sales of over $1.77 billion in 2008, a record high, while U.S. agricultural imports from the Philippines reached $ 1.24 billion during the same period.