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General Notes: preliminary intervention options are ranked from most promising to less promising
In my prioritisation I gave more weight to feasibility and tractibility, as I think it is generally preferable to start with a smaller success as a new organisation than take on something too ambitious initially. That said, choosing an imortant topic still matters (also see Adin's thoughts on hits-based approaches, hence favouring the most important interventions even if somewhat less tractable).
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InterventionProsConsComments
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Post-harvest storage* large losses (~20%+ of harvest) can be averted relatively easily
* simple intervention, easy to do in a small local area initially
* high chance of success and clear, visible improvements in food security		* progress is already being made on this issue without us, so our work could be less additional
* does not help families with no grain to store in the first place		This intervention is already at a later stage than the others, in that high-quality studies including RCTs have been doen showing effectiveness in reducing food loss, and to a degree in reducing food insecurity, which means there is already a bandwaggon to jump on, making any work easier, but it is also less unique and visionary
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Early Warning System* FSH is perhaps better suited to this sort of high-level systems work than eg on the ground distributing seeds (or even coordinating other distributing seeds)
* many actors recognise need for EWS, and it would be an important improvement, so perhaps just a few well-targeted nudges could get larger actors moving		* very large and complex undertaking, not ideal when we are just starting out
* perhaps better suited to a large and powerful group (FAO?) leading this campaign to have a better chance of getting others to fall into line, as important for many parties to be well-coordinated
* no data on how large improvements would be, this seems to be higher-hanging fruit than some others 		Seemingly this requires a deeper experience in the field to implement well (than eg recommending hermetic bag distributions), so perhaps to be tackled later or by some other group
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Improved/GM seeds* aligned with incentives of farmers, companies and govs, so should be easier and popular to accomplish
* simple intervention, easy to do in a small local area initially
* strong evidence-base that yields can be increased significantly		* FSH not unusually well-placed to make changes here given profit motive is already present in abundance for big Ag
* possible resitance from activists		Unclear what the limiting factors currently are for expansion of improved seeds
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Diversity of Cultivars* environmental activist groups onside
* also valuable for climate change adaptation
* strong body of research suggesting diversity is generally good		* requires significant change of practice on farmer's part with limited clear gain for individual farmers
* more complex to implement (need to tailor-make recommendations to each locale, train farmers in new crops and techniques)
* less robust evidence base that there would be large yield gains
* not currently widely practices in rich countries, so harder to model off in food-insecure countries		governments should be quite receptive to this, even if farmers are unconvinced, as benefits accrue more at the national level than at the farm level from decorrelating risks
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Integrated Pest Management* enviornmental benefits of reduced pesticide use
* good longer term solution as pesticides become less effective		* relatively vague, amorphous recommendations
* complex to implement, requires extensive farmer training
* hard to replicate and scale up quickly
* not currently widely practiced in rich countries, so harder to model off in food-insecure countries		perhaps there will be a stronger case in a few years once FSH is more mature and best-practice is clearer with more discrete, easily-implemented recommednations
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