sustainable global food system. This will take investment in the infrastructure needed to get food from producers to markets, sustainable management of natural resources like water, development of the right skills, new science and technology to help adapt to climate change, and improvement in land rights that open access to credit. It will also take a level playing field. We need to strengthen our international trading system to help people trade more freely and better compete in world markets. That’s why we need a more ambitious and balanced Doha Development Deal.
Food security does not just involve increasing the production capacity and responsiveness of farmers: it’s also about wasting less. The UN estimates global harvests and food chain waste – before even reaching the shop shelves – at around 1400 calories per person, per day. If we stopped wasting those 1400 calories, we’d have the food it’s estimated we’ll need by 2050.
In response to the events of 2008, Defra’s first ever UK Food Security Assessment was published in 2009 - and was widely welcomed for its holistic approach. It argues that, given the right tools, the world’s food producers can respond to rising demand, as they have in the past, and concludes that UK food security is best served through well-functioning markets and strong, diverse trade links. It is our policy to seek to boost production.
But the report did highlight global environmental sustainability as a particular concern. This is why sustainable agriculture and food chains must be a key driving force of the green economy we need to build in the years ahead, both domestically and internationally. There is already a growing movement to reduce carbon emissions, water, waste and transport use, through initiatives such as the Food and Drink Federation’s ‘5-fold Ambition’ and the British Retail Consortium’s ‘ A Better Retailing Climate’.
Example- Cadbury’s Cocoa Partnership, where £45 million over 10 years is being invested to secure the sustainability of cocoa farmers and their communities in
Ghana, India, Indonesia and the Caribbean. Unilever, Sainsbury’s and others are founding members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, committing to 100 percent sustainable sourcing by 2015 or earlier. My department is mapping UK consumption of palm oil to identify steps towards more sustainable sourcing nationwide.
These kinds of initiatives are being replicated across Europe, where an industry-led Sustainable Consumption and Production Roundtable is working to reduce the environmental impact of food through environmental footprinting and the creation of a voluntary eco-label.
The direction of travel is clear – a demonstrable commitment to ethical sourcing and sustainability will be increasingly expected of the industry as a whole by both consumers and investors.
UK businesses and government now have the opportunity, working with our international partners, to show global leadership. This month Professor Sir John Beddington will publish a major two-year study from the ‘Foresight’ Programme, ‘Global Food and Farming Futures’.
This project, which has brought together an impressive range of international experts, from the UN, EU, World Bank and industry, and draws on previous international studies including the IAASTD and UN World Development Report, has analysed the global food system from production to plate and fast-forwarded to what the global picture will look like out to 2050.
This report will equip us to understand the emerging challenges to food security and identify how new science, new policies and new ways of working together can best meet these challenges, in the UK, in Europe and internationally.
|36| ENVIRONMENT INDUSTRY MAGAZINE
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