China will push for greater self-reliance in food

2022 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Natural Disasters ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
Animal Feed ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Arable Land ◽  
Xi Jinping ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Environmental Threats ◽  
Self Reliance

Significance President Xi Jinping last year called for "a sense of crisis about food security”. Behind such statements lies an awareness of environmental threats and natural disasters, a shrinking and ageing farm labour force, shortages of water and arable land, and food waste on an enormous scale. Impacts China cannot avoid dependence on imports of animal feed as its population's demand for meat rises further. Beijing will make greater efforts to diversify foreign sources of feed imports. China is immutably locked into overseas dependence for soybeans, and potentially maize and barley, too.

scholarly journals How to measure food loss and waste? A material flow analysis application

2020 ◽  
Vol 123 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera Amicarelli ◽  
Christian Bux ◽  
Giovanni Lagioia
Keyword(s):  
Food Waste ◽  
Material Flow ◽  
Animal Feed ◽  
Flow Analysis ◽  
Material Balance ◽  
Material Flow Analysis ◽  
Potato Industry ◽  
Poultry Feed ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Food Loss

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to measure food loss and waste by material flow analysis (MFA) tool. Applying this methodology, the authors estimate wastage-related losses and discuss opportunities for more circular and sustainable practices in the Italian potato industry.Design/methodology/approachMFA is applied to two specific typologies as follows: ready-to-eat (chips) and dried potato products produced in Italy. The analysis refers to the year 2017 as the complete dataset useful for this study includes measurements until this year. A bottom-up and top-down mixed approach is applied, and functional unit refers to 1 t of potatoes consumed as final product.FindingsMFA is applied to quantify and qualify material balance associated with 1 t of potatoes consumed as final product. In Italy, in 2017, more than 22,000 t of fresh tubers were lost, including 3,500–4,800 t of starch, equivalent to 52,800–72,600 GJs. Moreover, fewer than 23,000 t of skins and scraps were produced within industrial plants, not available for food but suitable for animal feed (dry skins are an excellent carbohydrates source in cattle and poultry feed), starch industry and bioenergy production (biogas and/or bioethanol).Originality/valueThis research is one of the few studies proposing MFA methodology as a tool to measure food waste. This analysis shows its utility in terms of food waste quality/quantity evaluation, supporting both company management and policymakers.

Technology will be key to China’s food self-reliance

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Genetically Modified Crops ◽  
State Ownership ◽  
Market Forces ◽  
Xi Jinping ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Commercial Cultivation ◽  
Self Reliance ◽  
Self Sufficiency ◽  
Moderate Scale

Significance Their view reflects a renewed preoccupation with grain self-sufficiency. As President Xi Jinping put it in July, “the more risks and challenges we face, the more we should fill our bowls with Chinese grain”. Impacts More ‘moderate-scale’ farms, including some run by companies, will replace traditional household plots. State ownership of all farmland will continue, but market forces may be given a greater role. Commercial cultivation of genetically modified crops may finally be on the horizon. Application of artificial intelligence to agriculture will increase, albeit from a very low base.

Loss of farmland puts China's food security at risk

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Soil Pollution ◽  
Local Governments ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Arable Land ◽  
International Standards ◽  
Market Mechanisms ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Access To Credit ◽  
Double Cropping

Subject China and food security. Significance A new law to prevent soil pollution took effect last month -- the latest move in Beijing’s long-running battle to ensure China’s food security by preventing the loss of arable land. Soil pollution has taken a serious toll on a disproportionately small endowment of farmland that is shrinking due to desertification and urbanisation. Impacts The reliance of local governments on revenue from land sales will work against central government efforts to protect farmland. There is still scope to raise agricultural productivity by improving technology, access to credit, market mechanisms and land consolidation. Cereal yields are high by international standards, and scope to extend double-cropping is limited, especially in major grain regions.

China’s food security challenge is chronic, not acute

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Animal Feed ◽  
African Swine Fever ◽  
Human Consumption ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Self Sufficiency ◽  
Security Challenge ◽  
Food Imports ◽  
Protein Rich ◽  
High Degree

Significance Massive pig losses from African swine fever have reduced pork supplies and raised meat prices. The COVID-19 lockdown took a temporary toll on China’s internal distribution of food supplies and farm inputs. Disruption of food imports due to pandemic-related supply chain disruption remains a risk. President Xi Jinping recently warned that China must “must maintain a sense of crisis about food security”. Impacts China has achieved a very high degree of food self-sufficiency for decades; there is no reason to doubt that this will continue. The pandemic and strained China-US relations fundamentally alter the context of Beijing’s future food security strategy. China’s shift towards a protein-rich, toxin-free diet will affect imports of meat for human consumption, and corn and soya for animal feed. Labour and land pressures will mean more capital-intensive production, application of biotechnology, and scaling-up of production.

Designing an Automated Composter for Food Waste Management with the Implementation of Internet of Things

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
N. A. Fakharulrazi ◽  
◽  
F. Yakub ◽  
M. N. Baba ◽  
L. F. Zhao ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Internet Of Things ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
High Efficiency ◽  
Animal Feed ◽  
Modern Technology ◽  
Constant Attention ◽  
Whole Process ◽  
Handling Cost ◽  
Unpleasant Odor ◽  
Environmentally Friendly Method

Composting food waste is a delicate procedure that requires specific infrastructure and machinery that can gradually transform the wastes to nutrient-rich manure. Nevertheless, it also desires a constant attention by experts to achieve a quality outcome. Therefore, automatic composting machinery is a promising new idea as modern technology is taking over the world with it high efficiency. The objective of this paper is to build a fully automated composting machine that can help to reduce food waste using a more efficient and environmentally friendly method. This machine has its special features of heating, cooling and grinding which is simple and easy to use for every consumer at just one touch of a button. In addition, it uses a special filter to eliminate unpleasant odor to ensure consumer’s space of mind. The composting process uses node microcontroller (MCU) to run its operation and Internet of Things (IoT) with a developed mobile application to measure the amount of food waste, current process and its moisture content before turning the waste into high nutrient flakes at around 10% of its original volume. It will also notify the consumer when the whole process is done and the final product is ready to use. The produced flakes are good for nurturing soils, use as fertilizer, and renewable source of energy or animal feed. The benefit is to help reduce handling cost of waste at landfill. Excessive logistical energy is required to send food waste to landfill if conventional equipment is applied. This product has a high potential to penetrate the end users who usually cooks at home and also the industrial food manufacturers whether from medium to large which produces a lot of raw waste. Essentially, this machine allows food waste, through implementation of IoT to be converted to usable fertilizer.

Status of Food Security in Banten Province, Indonesia

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Weksi Budiaji
Keyword(s):  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Arable Land ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Soil Types ◽  
Indicator Variables ◽  
Cereal Production ◽  
The Status ◽  
Vast Area

This paper discusses the status of food security in Banten Province, Indonesia based on regional and city characteristics. Secondary data is used and is analyzed descriptively covering population dynamics, the population living in poverty, cereal production, disaster risk and soil types. Tangerang Region is found to have the largest population with the greatest number of people living in poverty among the regions and cities in Banten Province. Cereal production is dominated by the regions rather than the cities due to their vast area. Regarding arable land, flooding is the most threatening disaster in the major rice producing areas. In order to identify the distributions of regions and cities regarding food security, three indicator variables of food security dimensions are plotted, namely, cereal normative consumption, proportion of the population living in poverty, and proportion of malnourished babies. The three regions of Pandeglang Region, Lebak Region and Serang Region are grouped together in a less secure group.

scholarly journals Managing food security through food waste and loss: Small data to big data

2018 ◽  
Vol 98 ◽  
pp. 367-383 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zahir Irani ◽  
Amir M. Sharif ◽  
Habin Lee ◽  
Emel Aktas ◽  
Zeynep Topaloğlu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Big Data ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
Small Data

The impact of executives’ perceptions of environmental threats and organizational slack on innovation strategies

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 216-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chengyuan Wang ◽  
Biao Luo ◽  
Yong Liu ◽  
Zhengyun Wei
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Theory ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Ordinary Least Squares ◽  
Organizational Slack ◽  
Least Squares Regression ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Environmental Threats ◽  
Innovation Strategies ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

Purpose The paper aims to study the relationship between executives’ perceptions of environmental threats and innovation strategies and investigate the moderating effect of contextual factor (i.e. organizational slack) on such relations. It proposes a dualistic relationship between executives’ perceptions of environmental threats and innovation strategies, in which different perceptions of environmental threats will lead to corresponding innovation strategies, and dyadic organizational slack can promote such processes. Design/methodology/approach The paper is based on a survey with 163 valid questionnaires, which were all completed by executives. Hierarchical ordinary least-squares regression analysis is used to test the hypotheses proposed in this paper. Findings The paper provides empirical insights about that executives tend to choose exploratory innovation when they perceive environmental changes as likely loss threats, yet adopt exploitative innovation when perceiving control-reducing threats. Furthermore, unabsorbed slack (e.g. financial redundancy) positively moderates both relationships, while absorbed slack (e.g. operational redundancy) merely positively influences the relationship between the perception of control-reducing threats and exploitative innovation. Originality/value The paper bridges the gap between organizational innovation and cognitive theory by proposing a dualistic relationship between executives’ perceptions of environmental threats and innovation strategies. The paper further enriches innovation studies by jointly considering both subjective and objective influence factors of innovation and argues that organizational slack can moderate such dualistic relationship.

scholarly journals Unemployment and spell duration during the Great Recession in the EU

2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 216-235 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Gradín ◽  
Olga Cantó ◽  
Coral del Río
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Unemployment Spells ◽  
Practical Implications ◽  
The Eu

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze the different dynamic characteristics of unemployment in a selected group of European Union countries during the current Great Recession, which had unequal consequences on employment depending on the country considered. Design/methodology/approach – The paper follows Shorrocks’s proposal of a duration-sensitive measure of unemployment, and uses cross-sectional data reported by Eurostat coming from European Labour Force Surveys. Findings – The results add some evidence on the relevance of incorporating spells’ duration in measuring unemployment, finding remarkable differences in unemployment patterns in time among European countries. Research limitations/implications – In this paper unemployment is analyzed for all the labor force. Future research should investigate patterns across specific groups such as young people, women, immigrants or the low skilled. Practical implications – It is generally accepted that the negative impact of unemployment on individual welfare can be very different depending on its duration. However, conventional statistics on unemployment do not adequately capture to what extent the recession is not only increasing the incidence of unemployment but also its severity in terms of duration in time of ongoing unemployment spells. The paper shows an easy and practical way to do it in order to improve the understanding of the unemployment phenomenon, using information usually reported by statistical offices. Originality/value – First, the paper provides a tool for dynamic analysis of unemployment based on reported cross-sectional data. Second, the paper demonstrates the empirical relevance of considering spells’ duration when assessing differences in unemployment across countries or in unemployment trends. This is usually neglected or only partially addressed by most conventional measures of unemployment.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document