World Food Day Spotlight: Dr Hemant Tripathi
The 2025 World Food Day theme is 'Hand in Hand for Better Foods and a Better Future'. We're sharing the inspiring work of researchers in the faculty that are contributing to food sustainability.
Dr Hemant Tripathi is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the School of Biology, whose work covers ecology, agriculture and public health. Focusing on smallholder farming systems in Africa, Dr Tripathi’s research looks at how biodiversity, soil health, and climate resilience can help communities grow food more sustainably.
What are your main areas of research focus?
Agroecology, biodiversity, soil health, climate resilience, and One-Health linkages across African smallholder farming systems. My research integrates ecological field data, remote sensing, and socio-economic indicators to understand how farming practices influence ecosystem functions and human wellbeing.
What drives your research?
I’m driven by the need to understand how biodiversity supports food production in the context of climate change and agricultural transformation. Transitions toward climate-smart and conservation-based agriculture create opportunities for synergy but can also generate ecological trade-offs. My research aims to uncover how adaptive management can sustain ecosystem functions such as natural pest regulation and disease suppression while improving yields and rural livelihoods.
What are you working on at the moment?
I am currently working within the FoSTA-Health project, which investigates the ecological and health consequences of agricultural transformation in sub-Saharan Africa. The project brings together partners from the UK, Zambia, Malawi, and South Africa to understand how shifts from traditional mixed farming to more intensive or commercial systems affect biodiversity, food security, and human wellbeing.
My component focuses on how changes in land use, cropping patterns, and agroecological practices influence the diversity of natural enemies, pest populations, and disease risk. Using field surveys and spatial models, we aim to identify strategies such as habitat diversification, reduced pesticide reliance, and mixed-cropping that enhance biological control and ecosystem stability under climate stress.
Image: Farmers going to a local market on their bicycles to get seeds for planting. Photo by Hemant Tripathi.
What are your key findings related to food systems?
My research has shown that diversified and ecologically complex farms often experience fewer pest outbreaks and greater resilience to environmental variability.
I have also found that the benefits of biodiversity for pest control and soil function can decline sharply with agricultural intensification or habitat loss but can be restored through interventions like conservation buffers, intercropping, and organic soil management. These findings highlight that biodiversity and productivity are not competing goals and can be optimised together through adaptive management.
Image: A maize farm in chibombo, Central Zambia. Photo: Hemant Tripathi.
What is your vision for a sustainable or equitable food future?
My vision is of food systems that regenerate rather than deplete nature, where biodiversity, soil health, and climate resilience are central to food security. I see future farming landscapes where ecological restoration, carbon sequestration, and biodiversity enhancement are part of daily agricultural practice.
By integrating these practices with emerging mechanisms such as carbon and biodiversity credits, farmers can be rewarded for adopting regenerative and nature-based approaches that store carbon, restore habitats, and improve resilience to climate and market shocks. Such incentive frameworks can align local livelihoods with global sustainability goals and make ecological stewardship a viable economic choice for millions of smallholders.
How does your work connect to this year’s World Food Day theme, ‘Hand in Hand for Better Foods and a Better Future’?
My work links ecology, agriculture, and public health in partnership with farmers, scientists, and policymakers. Through cross-sectoral collaboration, we identify practices that deliver both better food and better environments, integrating natural pest control, disease management, and biodiversity conservation as co-benefits of sustainable farming.
Image: Masuku fruit, cherished by communities in Northern Zambia. Photo by Hemant Tripathi.
What one change do we need to make for a better food future?
We need to embed biodiversity at the centre of agricultural policy and practice, recognising it as a living infrastructure that supports food security, ecosystem resilience, climate mitigation, and human health.
Read about Dr Hemant Tripathi’s work.
Further information
Top image: Hemant Tripathi.
