How can technological initiatives affect food production. Can they help to enable us us to feed the world’s growing population?
In 2017 The Lancet commissioned a report to look at, what it later called, ‘Food in the Anthropocene’. It’s remit was to “address the need to feed a growing global population a healthy diet whilst also defining sustainable food systems that will minimise damage to the planet”(1). It was funded by the Wellcome Foundation and brought together 19 commissioners and 16 authors from across 16 countries. Their fields of expertise lay in health, agriculture, environmental sustainability and political science. The findings were published in January 2019. In summing up, the 45 page report it outlined ten ‘key messages’. The overriding concerns of the report were if 820 million people have insufficient food today, how could we feed the planet in the future. It noted that current predictions for population growth would see 10 billion people on the planet by 2050, a burden which would not only exacerbate greenhouse-gas emissions and pollution but, could lead to over 2 billion people being hungry or malnourished.
The report advised a more integrated approach to diet and healthcare whilst lightly touching on the topic of family planning. It targeted a 50% reduction in food waste by 2050. Two of its ten messages suggested a diet of less red meat, a return to eating unsaturated fats and a move away from highly processed foods. he news and media agencies picked up on the animal protein debate and incited contention between omnivores and those believing in a plant-based diet. Meat producers, worldwide, talked of a conspiracy, citing that the Wellcome Foundation’s founder, Henry Wellcome, was a seventh day Adventist who preached vegetarianism and shunned red meat (2)
Shortly after its publication the world found itself in the throes of a global pandemic. Health and not food or the environment became the main news story for the next year.
When reading The Lancet report it is interesting to note how technology does not figure in any part of it. The commissioners were made up of 9 experts in health, nutrition and food science, 2 who specialised in climate change, 3 from food policy, 4 who had a background in sustainability and ecology and 1 bioethicist. There was no one with any expertise in technology and nowhere in the report does it consider how technology might affect food and agriculture in the next twenty years.
In 2018 at the EAT forum in Stokholm a panel was put together to give an overview about how food technology could influence our future. In it Sean De Cleene, Head of Food Security and Agriculture Initiatives at the World Economic Forum said that from 2010-2018 $145 billion dollars was given to start up businesses within the health market as opposed to $14 billion given to entrepreneurs within agriculture. He questioned why $450 billion per annum is spent on food subsidies when some of that money could potentially make more difference if invested in food science, helping to drive innovation and develop eco efficiency. Currently 40% of greenhouses gases are produced by the food industry. Small changes in world eating habits can make a big difference.
“if we were to reduce our consumption of animal proteins by 10-15% it would mean a reduction of 450 million hectares of agricultural land use resulting in an estimated 650-950 mega tonnes of greenhouse gases” (3) Sean De Cleene
Other panellist included Niklas Adalberth, Founder of the Norrsken Foundation. He spoke of how to support “impact entrepreneurs” defining them as “people who try to improve the world in some way”(4) He outlined two of over thirty projects supported by the foundation. One business allows consumers in Sweden and Norway to buy food online that has been wrongly labelled or has a short sell by date. Another, called Wefarm, is the biggest pier to pier network in the World. It connects over 850,000 small farmers in Kenya and Tanzani. It has been proven that Wefarm has increased crop yield significantly by enabling isolated farmers to share knowledge with their contemporaries.
Aside from the long term question of how to feed a planet of 10 billion people there are also short terms concerns about how countries can act in accordance with the Paris agreement. It is clear that advances in technology are imperative to achieve the targets set by 194 states and the European Union in 2016.
The Paris agreement sets targets but it is up to each country as to whether the policies that they set will stifle or encourage new technology.
What is the Paris Agreement?
EAT is a global, non-profit start up dedicated to transforming our global food system through sound science, impatient disruption and novel partnerships for more information. To find out more click the link below
References
1 Willett, W. et al, 2019, Food in the Anthropocene, The Lancet, 393, p447-92. Available at Food in the Anthropocene: the EAT–<i>Lancet</i> Commission on healthy diets from sustainable food systems (thelancet.com) (accessed 10 Feb 2021)
2 Blythman, J. 2019, Scrutinise the small print of Eat-Lancet, Wicked Leeks, Available at Scrutinise the small print of Eat-Lancet | Wicked Leeks (riverford.co.uk) (accessed 17 Feb 2021)
3 Eat Forum, 2018, How can new technology save our food system. Available at: How Can New Technology Save Our Food System? - EAT (eatforum.org) (Accessed 15 Feb 2021)
4 Norsken Foundation, 2021, Get investment, Available at Norrsken Foundation (Accessed 15 Feb 2021)
Comentários