In this episode of Bite the Talk, Oliver Camp of GAIN about the critical, interconnected challenges and opportunities between climate change and nutrition. He discusses how the Initiative on Climate Action and Nutrition (I-CAN) is working to find "win-win" solutions, urging for better integration of nutrition into climate policies and finance ahead of COP30.
In Episode 27 of "Bite the Talk," host Mark Gachagua is joined by Oliver Camp, the Environment and Food Systems Advocacy Advisor at GAIN. The episode provides a deep dive into the critical intersection of climate change and nutrition, exploring how these two agendas are being integrated across policies, finance, and national strategies.
The "Helicopter View": Ollie begins by outlining the crucial connections between climate and nutrition. He explains that climate change impacts nutrition in numerous ways, such as reducing crop yields and their nutritional content, causing livestock losses, increasing food spoilage due to higher temperatures, and physically disrupting access to food through climate shocks. Conversely, food production itself contributes to climate change through emissions from agriculture, land clearing, and livestock .
GAIN and the I-CAN Initiative: A significant portion of the discussion focuses on the Initiative on Climate Action and Nutrition (I-CAN), which GAIN helps lead. Ollie explains that I-CAN works to identify "win-win" solutions by assessing how well climate and nutrition are integrated in policies (like NDCs and NAPs), finance (like the GCF and ODA), and private sector behavior . The goal is to encourage greater integration, making climate policies more nutrition-sensitive and nutrition policies more climate-sensitive.
Country Progress and "Win-Wins": While cautious about picking favorites, Ollie notes that many countries are making progress, citing examples like Cambodia and small island states (e.g., Barbados, UAE) for their comprehensive approaches . He emphasizes that aligning these agendas offers significant "win-win" opportunities, such as cutting food loss and waste, which benefits both the environment and food availability .
The Finance Gap: A major challenge identified is the gap in climate finance. Ollie highlights that only a small percentage of climate finance is directed toward food systems and nutrition , despite food systems accounting for about a third of greenhouse gas emissions. He argues for the need to translate high-level strategies into robust, "investable proposals" that speak the language of climate funders and leverage private finance.
Looking Ahead to COP30: The conversation shifts to the upcoming COP30 in Belém, Brazil. Ollie sees opportunities to raise nutrition's visibility through new NDCs, the Brazilian-led "Belém Declaration on Hunger", and the COP Presidency's Action Agenda, which includes a specific objective on nutrition and diets. His key advice for governments is to look for "multiple outcomes" (co-benefits like health, jobs, and nutrition) and to create detailed, investable proposals based on their climate commitments.
Lighter Moments: The episode concludes with a lighter segment where Mark asks Ollie about his favorite childhood snack. Mark shares his love for roasted maize with chili and lemon , while Ollie admits to being a "proper British boy" who eats porridge daily but has a weakness for roasted, salted cashew nuts.
Parting Shot: Ollie's final message is one of optimism, reiterating that the "win-win opportunities... are too good to miss" and that now is the time for commitment, creativity, and connection to drive action .
Mark Gachagua (00:09) Welcome to Bite the Talk, the podcast that dives into stories, strategies, and systems shaping our global food systems. We are your hosts, Lawrence and Mark Gachagua. Today, we're exploring how nutrition and climate action are being consciously integrated across policies, finance systems, and national strategies. Progress is happening, and GAIN is part of it through its leadership in the Initiative on Climate Action and Nutrition, also known as ICAN.
Today, we're very lucky and blessed to have a wonderful guest who is going to walk us through this. I'm pleased to welcome Oliver Camp, who is currently the Environment and Food Systems Advocacy Advisor at the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition. Oliver brings extensive experience in nutrition and climate action, working on policies and partnerships that bridge these two agendas. Oliver, welcome to the podcast. I hear people call you Oli.
Oliver Camp (01:15) Thanks, Mark. Usually Oli, rarely Oliver, but either way is fine, and it's great to be with you on the podcast. Joining such a distinguished lineup of speakers from previous episodes, I'm happy to be with you.
Mark Gachagua (01:27) Thank you so much. What did you have for breakfast, if you don't mind me asking?
Oliver Camp (01:32) I'm a regular, proper British boy here—porridge every day. It's healthy and nutritious. Maybe some nuts and seeds for some of those healthy fats. It's a good start to the day.
Mark Gachagua (01:43) Good that you mentioned that. In my office, I have an orange-fleshed sweet potato uji mix. Uji is porridge, so it's a good alternative to other starches, and I think sweet potato is more nutritious than just having the regular maize, which is very popular on this side of the pond. Let's start with the helicopter view, as I like calling it. What are the connections between climate change and nutrition?
Oliver Camp (02:14) It's such a crucial area. Our world is defined today by our response to climate change. It's going to be a huge issue over the coming years and decades. My view—and our view at GAIN and ICAN—is that one of the key ways people will experience the effects of climate change is through access to sufficient, adequate, nutritious food.
There will be other impacts, of course. We'll see exposure to extreme heat, extreme weather events, climate shocks, and disasters, which will have major acute effects. But in terms of the long-term impacts, food security—including good nutrition—and water security will be two of the key points we'll have to look at.
Climate change already is, and is projected to have, a major impact on yields of all kinds of foods—crop yields, livestock losses, and changes to fisheries. So, nutritious foods will probably just be produced in lower quantities. Then there are impacts that may seem less direct, like the fact that climate change affects the nutritional content of crops. When there's more CO2 in the atmosphere, the nutrient content of crops goes down. That could have a major impact on people's nutrition, particularly for those who depend on staples for their micronutrients.
Add to that higher temperatures leading to faster spoilage, or climate shocks preventing physical access to nutritious foods. The most vulnerable will feel this the most—marginalized groups and people with higher nutritional needs, like women of reproductive age, adolescents, and children.
On the flip side, our diets also have an effect on the climate. Producing food takes energy and resources like land, water, and agrochemicals. If we use fossil fuels for agricultural machinery or clear forests to grow more food, we increase carbon emissions. Livestock production increases methane emissions. To produce nutritious food, we need to reduce the environmental impact so we aren't exacerbating climate change, while ensuring people have continued access to those foods.
Mark Gachagua (05:33) I agree, Oli. I can only imagine how countries and governments are trying to strike this balance. Have you seen any good examples of countries taking action to ensure sustainable food production and demonstrate climate-smart agriculture?
Oliver Camp (06:10) For sure, and I think this is where we have some reason to be optimistic. We've seen, especially in the last few years, that countries really are taking ambitious action on food.
Look at the UN Food Systems Summit in 2021—over 160 countries now have a food systems pathway. Those pathways are great because they connect across climate change adaptation, resilience, nutrition, food security, and other areas of development like jobs and livelihoods.
We're increasingly seeing this reflected in climate commitments, like the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). Although we only have a few NDCs from the newly updated round this year, there are promising signs that countries are better integrating food systems. The same is true for National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). Countries recognize that food and nutrition security are a crucial part of adaptation, building in things like climate-smart agriculture on the resilient side, and looking across the value chain at how we can cut food loss and waste or strengthen infrastructure.
There's momentum, and there is ambitious action on paper. Now it's a case of accelerating that action because these problems are urgent. Looking at the Sustainable Development Goals, we only have five years left to achieve what we set out to do in 2015.
Mark Gachagua (08:23) Thank you, Oli. You mentioned the pathways and the ambitious commitments needed. Assuming some government officials are listening to this podcast and perhaps don't have a deep understanding of why this matters—why is aligning climate and nutrition so vital, and how is GAIN helping?
Oliver Camp (09:08) There are two ways of looking at this. I've covered the connected challenges, but the other way is the opportunity. There are so many connections that offer us win-wins. We are fortunate that nutritious foods are often also good for the environment.
There are no-brainers, like cutting food loss and waste. That’s great for the environment because we're not wasting resources or producing methane emissions from rotting food, and it means more nutritious foods are available to consume. When you pair healthy diets with sustainable production practices, you get low-emission diets that are incredibly healthy for us.
What we do with our country partners through GAIN and ICAN is work on policies and plans that seek out those win-wins. Following COP30, countries will need to accelerate action and pinpoint where programmatic interventions and investments lie to tap into those opportunities.
Mark Gachagua (11:20) Fantastic. Thank you for leading this piece of work. I know ICAN tracks progress across several key areas. Do you mind telling us what those areas are and how progress is shaping up?
Oliver Camp (11:44) For ICAN, it means looking across policy, strategy, financing, the private sector, and academia to assess the extent to which we look at climate and nutrition in an integrated fashion.
In 2023, we did a major analysis with ICAN partners. We took climate policies, like NDCs or NAPs, and looked at how nutrition was integrated. Then we did the reverse—looking at national nutrition plans to see how responsive they were to climate change. We also looked at food-based dietary guidelines, public procurement policies, finance (like the Green Climate Fund or ODA), and private sector behavior.
What you find is that climate policy can become more nutrition-sensitive, nutrition policies can be more climate-sensitive, and financing portfolios could easily build in these co-benefits. There are plenty of good examples of integration already. We're renewing this report ahead of COP30, and I think we'll see encouraging signs again.
Mark Gachagua (14:43) It's really good to hear that funders are interested. We can have immaculate plans, but implementation is key. Do you know of any countries setting good examples in integrating climate and nutrition?
Oliver Camp (15:19) I'm cautious about picking favorites because so many countries are doing good work, and it's very context-specific. But looking at our upcoming report in October, Cambodia has some really wide-ranging points integrated into their NDC. They’re part of the Alliance of Champions for Food Systems Transformation, so it's encouraging to see them follow through.
Many Small Island Developing States, like the UAE and Barbados, have very comprehensive NDCs. On the African continent, Somalia and Lesotho have some really interesting commitments.
One point I’d add: the overall policy framework can be comprehensive, but often different parts of policy live in different ministries. Sometimes the biggest opportunity is connecting horizontally within a country so that food, climate, and nature policies are all speaking the same language.
Mark Gachagua (18:11) Those are good examples. Clearly, finance is an integration gap. What can be done to get climate finance doing more for nutrition, especially with COP30 just around the corner?
Oliver Camp (18:51) This is literally the trillion-dollar question. We recently had encouraging meetings in Rome with the Standing Committee on Finance to discuss climate finance to agri-food systems.
A couple of years ago, the ICAN report found that only a couple of percent of funding from sources like the GCF or ODA went explicitly into nutrition outcomes alongside climate. The Standing Committee on Finance itself estimated that only between 3% and 4% of climate finance is going toward food systems. That's crazy, considering food systems account for about a third of greenhouse gas emissions.
What do we do? Part of it is advocacy. Food systems are complicated. Unlike energy, where it's clear money needs to go into efficiency and renewable capacity, food investments span climate-smart agriculture, infrastructure, cold storage, processing, and diet-side interventions.
We need robust plans translated into investable proposals that meet the criteria of climate funders. We need to show how projects benefit mitigation and adaptation while leveraging private finance. The target set at COP29 was $300 billion, with a wider target of $1.3 trillion through the Baku to Belém roadmap. It's a relatively small pot of money when you consider the food system is worth $15 to $20 trillion, so we have to make that money go further.
Mark Gachagua (22:47) That's a very clear picture. Let's shift gears and focus on COP30 in Belém, Brazil. What opportunities do you see for nutrition to gain more visibility, and how can we ensure food systems remain central to the climate agenda?
Oliver Camp (23:32) It's a unique COP—the first time we've had one in the Amazon rainforest.
Firstly, the level of ambition we see in the delayed NDCs coming in between September and November will set the tone. Are they looking beyond energy and into food systems?
Second, new commitments. Brazil is putting forward the Belém Declaration on Hunger, Poverty, and Human-Centered Climate Action. It links closely to President Lula's agenda to end hunger. We’ve suggested making the nutrition components more explicit, but it's a great place for countries to renew commitments.
Then there are initiatives like the Tropical Forests Forever Facility (TFFF), which looks at incentives to preserve the rainforest, and the RAISE initiative, which focuses on land degradation and regenerative agriculture.
Finally, the COP Presidency Action Agenda. Brazil has come up with themes they want to highlight, including agriculture and food security, with a key objective of ensuring access to adequate nutrition and diets for all. We're developing solutions to support that objective.
Mark Gachagua (28:25) If you had to name one or two priorities for governments going into COP30—particularly focusing on climate financing and nutrition outcomes—what would they be?
Oliver Camp (29:19) First, make sure we're looking across multiple outcomes. It's not just about climate adaptation or mitigation; it's about co-benefits like jobs, health, nutrition, and farmer livelihoods. Looking at multiple issues helps you find the win-wins.
Second, regarding climate finance, it's about putting together investable proposals. Start with robust policies that show government commitment, then break those high-level strategies down into specific projects that speak the language of climate funders. This is where organizations like GAIN can help support member states to accelerate action on the ground.
Mark Gachagua (31:37) I agree. As we wind down, we usually like to ask our guests: what was your favorite healthy snack while growing up? For me, walking home from primary school, I enjoyed roasted maize with a dash of zesty lemon and chili powder. What did you enjoy?
Oliver Camp (32:46) Thanks for adding the caveat "healthy," otherwise I would have had to own up to something not approved by our audience!
I'm big on fresh fruit and veg. Living in the UK, you get good produce, but traveling around Europe, you find special stuff. I was recently in Romania, where my wife is from, and eating fresh fruit straight off the tree is glorious. But my real guilty pleasure? Roasted, salted cashew nuts. If I'm sitting near a bowl, they're too good to refuse.
Mark Gachagua (33:28) You're tempting me now! You should fix a nice salad and pass our regards to your wonderful wife. Oli, what is your parting shot?
Oliver Camp (33:51) These win-win opportunities are just too good to miss. We can take action throughout food systems that is good for both the climate and nutrition. All it takes is commitment, creativity, and connection—working across government and with stakeholders to drive these co-benefits. Let's not pass it up. Now is the time.
Mark Gachagua (34:28) Thank you, Oli. It's always a big pleasure to have you on the podcast. We encourage our audience to follow you on LinkedIn; you share a lot of information that benefits all of us.
Oliver Camp (34:50) I appreciate that, Mark. Thanks for having me; it's been a pleasure.
Mark Gachagua (35:01) Once again, thank you, Oli, for guiding us through this critical nexus. The ICAN report shows momentum is building, but climate and nutrition financing must come into sharper focus.
To our wonderful audience, if this episode sparked your curiosity, please subscribe, share, and stay tuned for future explorations of bold food system strategies. Until then, stay informed and stay integrated. Keep building food systems that nourish people and the planet together. Thank you very much.