During the United Nations General Assembly meetings this week, Ban Ki-Moon has convened a high-level side event on the Zero Hunger Challenge. This initiative by the UN Secretary-General bears the tag line…
We are in the middle of one of the biggest experiments in human history. At its core is the homogenisation of global food systems, which increasingly must deliver the same products to an expanding population…
Studying one subject won’t help save the world.
Shutterstock
Across the globe, we are experiencing rapid changes to our environment and social structures. Climate change, population growth, and social unrest are causing ever increasing problems. The rate of change…
Some market gardens face being squeezed out by land-hungry developers.
Flickr/Indigo Skies Photography
Australia is regarded as a food-secure country and this is mostly true for bulk commodities such as dairy, grain and meat, which make up a large part of our diet. But many people are still failing to eat…
Cattle comes at a high cost, with or without a rosette.
Andrew Milligan/PA
That eating beef is environmentally costly is by now widely appreciated. But little has been done to curtail the amount of cattle farmed for meat consumption. To try and address this, my colleagues and…
LED growing lights, delivering sunlight whatever the weather.
Philips
The challenges of growing enough food to feed the world have grown more severe in the 21st century. We need to feed more people with limited agricultural land and resources. We need to make better use…
As a foodie, but also a vegetarian, I am always seeking alternative food systems that are healthy, farmer-friendly, community-focused, and easy to use —attributes that also make food systems sustainable…
Science has often come to the rescue when it comes to the world’s big problems, be it the Green Revolution that helped avoid mass starvation or the small pox vaccine that eradicated the disease. There…
The global growth in demand for food is outstripping supply and by the middle of the century there will be about a third more mouths on the planet to feed. The world’s middle class is expected to rise…
Wild food is generally wilder than this.
irrational_cat
In the UK, the wild food trend has re-acquainted people with the various edible plants to be found in the countryside. But around the world wild foods are relied on by a billion people as a key part of…
“The optimist”, wrote American fantasy fiction writer James Branch Cabell, “proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.” Reading about the global food…
In 2008, Chinese baby formula and milk products were tainted
with melamine, killing six babies and hospitalising many more.
EPA/Wu Hong
SPC Ardmona’s $22 million lifeline from the Victorian government seems to have saved Australia’s largest food packaging company. Yet the firm’s recent tribulations are a reminder of why I regularly choose…
Wheat fields in central New South Wales.
Sam Ilić/Flickr
Should Australia aim to become Asia’s “food bowl”? How can we help farmers earn more for what they produce? And how can Australia best contribute to global food security? Those are some of the crucial…
We need more, but more of what? Perhaps not this.
David Giles/PA
Resource-intensive agriculture, despite its productivity, nevertheless has failed to feed the world’s current population, never mind the nine billion people expected by 2050. This system that currently…
If the wells are dry, it doesn’t matter how many hands on the pumps.
Kevin Frayer/AP
Jacob Schewe, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
There are already many countries where the scarcity of water affects people’s lives. While water for drinking may be first to come to mind, as agriculture is the largest use of water worldwide water scarcity…
Raising livestock accounts for the largest single land-use on Earth. Cattle, sheep and goats, pigs and poultry occupy around 30% of the planet’s land area not covered in ice, generate 40% of the world’s…
Plenty of food in the shops, so why are people going hungry?
Julien Behal/PA
The only things that seem to be really growing in the UK and US economies these days are hunger and food insecurity. The growth of food banks and other forms of hunger-relief charities is a strong reminder…
People should not be hungry with the food, resources, and technology at our disposal.
PA
How much would you pay for staying alive? How much would you pay for breathing pure air? That may seem a silly question since air is everywhere, accessible to all. Air is a global public good, part of…