Climate change is poised to have a profound impact on the world’s agricultural systems in the coming decades. Already, scientists are documenting more robust weeds and drier soils that threaten crop yields. This scenario looms against a worrying backdrop that features ongoing food price volatility, more than 860 million people on the planet without enough to eat on a daily basis and world population growth that is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050. If humans are to thrive on this planet well into the future, our food system must not only be productive in the face of rising temperatures, but must also be sustainable on a long-term basis. The dominant food system today, based on industrial food production that is distributed on a global scale, is not on course to meet these requirements. But how can we fix it? This is the key question that Sarah Elton sets out to answer in Consumed: Sustainable Food for a Finite Planet.
Elton reveals her position early on...
Jennifer Clapp is Canada Research Chair in Global Food Security and Sustainability in the Faculty of Environment at the University of Waterloo. Her recent books include Food (Polity Press, 2012) and Hunger in the Balance: The New Politics of International Food Aid (Cornell University Press, 2012).
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