Healthy diets important for sustainable food production

Slash and burn agriculture in Bolivia / Neil Palmer (CIAT) / CC BY-SA

Healthy diets important for sustainable food production

A new model suggests it may be possible to feed the world's growing population with minimal environmental impact, but doing so will require targeted policies to reduce food waste and incentives towards healthier diets in industrialized nations.

Original Paper:
Bajželj, B., Richards, K. S., Allwood, J. M., Smith, et al. 2014. Importance of food-demand management for climate mitigation. Nature Climate Change. Online.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/NCLIMATE2353

By 2050, the world population will have grown by 2.6 billion people, an approximated 30-percent increase1. As the wealth of developing countries expands, it will likely result in increased demand for animal products like meat, creating a need for more farmland, which often comes at the loss of forested lands. A new model suggests that the negative impact of providing food for future generations can be greatly reduced through policies that encourage consumers in industrialized countries towards reduced-meat diets and by setting targets for food waste reduction.
 
A team of researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Aberdeen modeled six possible future food scenarios, taking into account different combinations of agricultural technology, food waste reduction efforts, and dietary changes. The study, published in Nature Climate Change in August 2014, highlights the importance of not just how much we eat, but what we eat, and what is wasted in the process. These issues are important considerations if we are to reduce carbon emissions and preserve the world's forests.
 
In developing their model, the researchers took into account several factors, including the rate of technological advancements in agriculture, and expectations of increased meat demand. In a business-as-usual scenario, they found that the amount of farmland required to meet global food demand would increase 42 percent relative to 2009. Over the same period, greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture would increase nearly 80 percent, and water demand for irrigation would more than double.
 
Conversely, the best-case scenario saw reductions in farmland and pastureland requirements, and a large drop in agricultural greenhouse gas emissions relative to 2009. The large difference between these two scenarios is largely due to the amount of animal products consumed globally and how much effort is made to reduce global food waste. In the latter scenario, the researchers imagined the possibility of halving global food waste through food storage improvements in developing countries and increased food waste awareness elsewhere. This was paired in industrialized countries with policies that incentivize reduced consumption of sugar, oil, meats, and dairy products.
 
The idea that an additional 2.6 billion people could be fed with less land than we currently use is surprising, but this result underlines the large inefficiencies in meat production. The authors estimate that about 70 percent of meat production is inefficient due to its use of land. Inefficient land use poses a range of environmental issues, including the loss of biodiversity and the release of large amounts of greenhouse gases.
 
Much current research in meeting future agricultural demand has focused on technological improvements in farming, through such developments as more productive crop varieties, new pesticides, or improved fertilizer use efficiency. The authors estimate that these advancements alone will not be enough to limit the environmental impacts of agricultural expansion. Instead, sustainable growth in agriculture requires the addition of incentives for industrialized nations to reduce consumption of animal products, and global policies to address food waste. 

References:
1. DESA, UN. "World Population Prospects, The 2012 Revision." New York: Department for Economic and Social Affairs (2013).

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