scholarly journals How to Prevent and Cope with Coincidence of Risks to the Global Food System

2021 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shenggen Fan ◽  
Emily EunYoung Cho ◽  
Ting Meng ◽  
Christopher Rue
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Emerging Diseases ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Global Food

The global food system faces major risks and threats that can cause massive economic loss; dislocation of food supply chains; and welfare loss of producers, consumers, and other food system actors. The interrelated nature of the system has highlighted the complexity of risks. Climate change, extreme weather events, and degradation and depletion of natural resources, including water, arable, forestry, and pastural lands, loss of biodiversity, emerging diseases, trade chokepoints and disruptions, macroeconomic shocks, and conflicts, can each seriously disrupt the system. Coincidence of these risks can compound the effects on global food security and nutrition. Smallholder farmers, rural migrants, women, youth, children, low-income populations, and other disadvantaged groups are particularly vulnerable. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic exemplifies a perfect storm of coincidental risks. This article reviews major risks that most significantly impact food systems and highlights the importance of prospects for coincidence of risks. We present pathways to de-risk food systems and a way forward to ensure healthy, sustainable, inclusive, and resilient food systems. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Environment and Resources, Volume 46 is October 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Pathways to a sustainable, inclusive and healthy food system

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franziska Gaupp
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Food System ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Climate Extreme ◽  
System Transformation ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Health Promoting ◽  
Key Policy ◽  
Global Food

<p>Currently, the global food system is the single largest threat to people and planet. Food is the leading cause behind transgressing five of the nine planetary boundaries. It is a major source of carbon emissions, as well as the single largest contributor to global deforestation, overuse of fresh water and eutrophication of our aquatic ecosystems. And while agriculture has been a major engine of poverty reduction, agricultural activities are unable to deliver a decent livelihood for an estimated 80 percent of those living in extreme poverty. The projected increase in frequency and severity of climate extreme events is posing additional threats to the global food system.</p><p>A transformation towards a more inclusive, sustainable and health-promoting food system is urgently needed. This presentation will introduce the newly established Food Systems Economics Commission (FSEC) that provides detailed and robust evidence assessing the implications of the policy and investment decisions needed to foster a food system transformation. It integrates global modelling tools such as integrated assessment modelling and innovative applications of agent-based modelling with political economy considerations.  It investigates the hidden costs of our current food system, explores transitions pathways towards a new food and land use economy and suggests key policy instruments to foster the transformation towards a sustainable, inclusive, healthy and resilient food system.</p>

Safe milk and risky quinoa

Focaal ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 (83) ◽  
pp. 72-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Astrid B. Stensrud
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Food System ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Free Market ◽  
Price Volatility ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Open Market ◽  
Irrigation Project ◽  
The World ◽  
Global Food

The neoliberal global food system has intensified the uncertainties associated with peasant farming and agrarian livelihoods around the world. This article examines processes of precarization among smallholder farmers in the Majes Irrigation Project in Peru. By discussing price volatility and uncertainty related to the “free market,” I argue that the conditions of small-scale entrepreneurial farmers today can best be understood in terms of gambling and precarity. After four decades of neoliberal deregulation, farmers in Majes describe agriculture as a “lottery” where one can win or lose everything. Despite prospects of growth and progress, most farmers rely on low-income dairy farming or contracted crops for agro-industrial corporations. The freedom to take risks in the open market entails uncertainty and often results in loss, and farmers must negotiate the ambiguous relation between autonomy and dependency.

scholarly journals Overcoming undesirable resilience in the global food system

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom H. Oliver ◽  
Emily Boyd ◽  
Kelvin Balcombe ◽  
Tim G. Benton ◽  
James M. Bullock ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Major Reform ◽  
Lock In ◽  
Global Food

Non-technical summaryOur current global food system – from food production to consumption, including manufacture, packaging, transport, retail and associated businesses – is responsible for extensive negative social and environmental impacts which threaten the long-term well-being of society. This has led to increasing calls from science–policy organizations for major reform and transformation of the global food system. However, our knowledge regarding food system transformations is fragmented and this is hindering the development of co-ordinated solutions. Here, we collate recent research across several academic disciplines and sectors in order to better understand the mechanisms that ‘lock-in’ food systems in unsustainable states.

Decolonizing Food Systems: Food Sovereignty, Indigenous Revitalization, and Agroecology as Counter-Hegemonic Movements

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 173-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonardo Figueroa-Helland ◽  
Cassidy Thomas ◽  
Abigail Pérez Aguilera
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
World System ◽  
Open Spaces ◽  
The World ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Critical Approaches ◽  
Global Food

Abstract We employ an intersection of critical approaches to examine the global food system crisis and its alternatives. We examine counterhegemonic movements and organizations advancing programs of constructive resistance and decolonization based on food sovereignty, indigenous revitalization and agroecology. Food system alternatives rooted in intersectional critiques of the world-system open spaces for materially-grounded, commons-based socioecological relations that make just, sustainable, and equitable worlds possible beyond a civilization in crisis.

scholarly journals Hunger and Obesity as Symptoms of Non-Sustainable Food Systems and Malnutrition

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 1062 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Steiner ◽  
Bernhard Geissler ◽  
Eva Schernhammer
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Calorie Intake ◽  
Sustainable Food Systems ◽  
Sustainable Food ◽  
Great Opportunity ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Global Food ◽  
Innovation Policies

Among the great challenges the world faces are how to ensure food security for its growing population—projected to rise to around 10 billion by 2050—so it can meet their nutritional needs for a healthy life. Current regulations and literature on food security mainly focus on food quantity (i.e., portion sizes), daily calorie intake and methods for increasing food production and too little on food and diet quality and the holistic effects of (mal)nutrition. From a systems perspective, in order to promote innovation policies for more sustainable food systems, food security cannot be viewed independently; rather, it is characterized by the interplay of an extensive network of economic, environmental and social dimensions that should all be taken into account in a comprehensive resilient and sustainable global food system. Here, we highlight one aspect of this vast network that we consider a particular challenge—yet also a great opportunity—for innovative policies geared toward more sustainable food systems: the interplay of hunger and obesity, including resulting policy strategies beyond potential efficiency improvements in farming practices. Future studies need to emphasize the importance of an in-depth understanding of the interdependencies within the global food system and its interrelatedness with societal and natural systems as part of coupled human-environment systems and in the face of continuing population growth and food demand globally. Recommended strategies for achieving sustainable food security systems include innovative educational approaches and stakeholder-driven innovation policies based on mutual learning processes between society, science, industry and policymakers, as well as fostering increased responsibility of all members of society along the agriculture and food value chain.

scholarly journals Food Systems for Human and Planetary Health: Economic Perspectives and Challenges

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shenggen Fan ◽  
Derek Headey ◽  
Christopher Rue ◽  
Timothy Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Food System ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Planetary Health ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Economic Perspectives ◽  
And Behavior

Food systems are currently facing unprecedented challenges. More than 690 million people still suffer hunger while climate change, rapid depletion of natural resources, and loss of biodiversity further threaten future food systems. Influential global reports emphasize the need for fundamental transformations of food systems for human and planetary health, but few incorporate economic considerations. This review adopts an economic lens to assessing potential transitions to ideal food systems that are productive, sustainable, nutritious, resilient, and inclusive. Our findings show that new technologies, policies, institutions, and behavior changes can leverage synergies for achieving multiple food system targets, but rigorous economic analysis is needed to further analyze trade-offs and to overcome complex behavioral, institutional, and political barriers. This review also points to important knowledge gaps that economists and other social scientists must address to contribute to the radical transformation of food systems. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Resource Economics, Volume 13 is October 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

scholarly journals Global food systems in the post-coronavirus era

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Chiles
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Environmental Sociology ◽  
Environmental Problems ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Treadmill Of Production ◽  
And Shifts ◽  
Global Food ◽  
Rare Opportunity

Coronavirus is currently dealing a concussive blow to global food systems, but this crisis could also present a rare opportunity to uncover and address longstanding social and environmental problems. The purpose of this paper is to shed additional light on this rapidly developing situation by (i) outlining the vulnerabilities and inequities in the global food system that have been exposed by the coronavirus, (ii) identifying the emergent sociotechnical shifts that have occurred in the initial stages of the post-coronavirus era, and then (iii) interpreting these vulnerabilities, inequities, and shifts from the standpoint of two key theories in environmental sociology: the treadmill of production and ecological modernization.

Collaborative institutional work to generate alternative food systems

Organization ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 314-336
Author(s):  
Sophie Michel
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Institutional Analysis ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Alternative Food ◽  
Institutional Work ◽  
Alternative Food Systems ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Global Food

Recently, there has been a proliferation of alternatives to the global food system. Yet, there is still an ongoing debate on their potential to transform the food system and challenge its globalization. This research introduces institutional analysis to the food system literature in order to comprehend actors’ efforts to scale up alternatives and transform the food system at the local level. Such efforts are explored from an inductive research of the organization called M-Local Food Project, which gathers a range of diverse actors to work on expanding alternative food and transforming the food system in eastern France. Based on this organization’s analysis and its collaborative institutional work, this research highlights how to organize collective agency from the collaboration of multiple actors to co-build an alternative food system and extends the debate on alternative food potential to challenge the dominant global food system. It also provides an emerging model of collaborative institutional work that enriches the institutional analysis on the coalition for institutional changes and offers practical advice on tensions for alternative organizations that cannot be overcome.

scholarly journals Response-to-Failure Analysis of Global Food System Initiatives: A Resilience Perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Prince Agyemang ◽  
Ebenezer Miezah Kwofie
Keyword(s):  
Failure Analysis ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Qualitative Evaluation ◽  
Global Food Security ◽  
Global Food System ◽  
Invaluable Tool ◽  
Transformational Framework ◽  
Global Food

International food system initiatives have led the efforts to combat the threats to global food security resulting from the failure of the current food systems. This study set out to investigate and assess the contributions of global food system initiatives in tackling the food system challenges. In assessing the food system initiatives, we develop a three-step methodology for Food System Initiative (FSI) selection and then conduct a qualitative evaluation using relevant indicators based on food system failure narratives. Furthermore, the authors synthesize present literature in the context of the extent to which coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has compounded food system challenges and, together with the response-to-failure analysis, recreate a resilient transformational framework, which will be an invaluable tool to FSI during and after the COVID-19 era, and guarantee we build back better. The findings show that while considerable effort is being made in addressing food system failures, the current COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the challenges and would require a paradigm shift not only in the implementation of conventional food system initiatives but also in the role of food system actors. The food system resilience framework presented provides useful pathway in expanding the understanding of the role of all key stakeholders and in identifying tipping points for building the desired resilience moving forward.

Chitosan and Derivatives: Bioactivities and Application in Foods

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Da-Yong Zhou ◽  
Zi-Xuan Wu ◽  
Fa-Wen Yin ◽  
Shuang Song ◽  
Ao Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Nutritional Value ◽  
Food System ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Food Science ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Coating Materials ◽  
Structural Modifications ◽  
Grafting Copolymerization

Chitosan is a biodegradable, biocompatible, and nontoxic aminopolysaccharide. This review summarizes and discusses the structural modifications, including substitution, grafting copolymerization, cross-linking, and hydrolysis, utilized to improve the physicochemical properties and enhance the bioactivity and functionality of chitosan and related materials. This manuscript also reviews the current progress and potential of chitosan and its derivatives in body-weight management and antihyperlipidemic, antihyperglycemic, antihypertensive, antimicrobial antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and immunostimulatory activities as well as their ability to interact with gut microbiota. In addition, the potential of chitosan and its derivatives as functional ingredients in food systems, such as film and coating materials, and delivery systems is discussed. This manuscript aims to provide up-to-date information to stimulate future discussion and research to promote the value-added utilization of chitosan in improving the safety, quality, nutritional value and health benefits, and sustainability of our food system while reducing the environmental hazards. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Food Science and Technology, Volume 12 is March 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

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