World Food Day campaign 2017

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World Food Day

Phil Hogan, EU Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development “Global hunger is on the rise – again.”

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IN THIS ISSUE

EU Commissioner for Health and Food Safety recalls childhood memories and calls for action on food waste.

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Start young The importance of training our taste buds in the first 1,000 days of a child’s life.

Additional stories on hunger, malnutrition and biofortification.

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ONLINE

Roots of change: make migration work for rural development

Throughout history, one of the most effective strategies to create a better future has been to move – usually leaving an impoverished rural area in search of more productive opportunities elsewhere.

M

igration has, since the dawn of time, been essential to the human story — the source of multiple economic and cultural benefits.

But when, due to extreme need, distress or despair, triggered by war, political instability, extreme poverty and hunger or environmental degradation, migration is another unhappy story.

This year’s slogan for World Food Day (16 October), “Change the future of migration. Invest in food security and rural development”, addresses the structural drivers of large movements of people in a bid to make migration safe, orderly and regular.

Swelling numbers of hungry people today make the issue more poignant. Some 815 million people suffered Follow us

from hunger in 2016, according to the 2017 SOFI (State of Food Security and Nutrition report) up from 777 million in 2015.

Conflicts were a major reason for the increase. They have driven northeast Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen to the brink of famine and triggered acute food insecurity also in Burundi, Iraq and elsewhere.

There are more forcibly displaced people today – around 64 million – than since the Second World War. But let’s set the story straight: Despite widely held perceptions, most of those who migrate remain in their countries of origin. There are around 763 million internal migrants worldwide, one in every eight people on the planet. Of the 244 million international migrants recorded in 2015, one-third came from G20 countries and moved to pursue more facebook.com/MediaplanetUK

productive opportunities. SouthSouth migratory flows are now larger than those from developing to the developed nations.

Make migration a choice

José Graziano da Silva Director-General, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

“There are around 763 million internal migrants worldwide - one in every eight people on the planet.” @MediaplanetUK

Distress migration as a last-resort strategy generates a tangle of moral, political and economic problems for migrants, their eventual hosts and the transit points in between. We all have roots and few of us wish to sever them.

Promoting inclusive rural development can curb conflict, enhance sustainability and make migration a matter of choice. Especially in sub-Saharan Africa, where population growth and rural poverty rates are high. Decent rural employment opportunities – led to productive agriculture and supporting activities ranging from seed research and credit

provision to storage infrastructure and food processing businesses – are urgently needed to convince young people in rural areas that there are better fates than hazardous journeys to unknown destinations.

To be sure, migration is part of rural development and remittances are a huge force for improving both rural welfare and farm productivity.

Migrants’ contribution to development needs to be recognised and cherished, as they are the bridges between countries of origin, transit and destination.

As co-chair in 2018 of the Global Migration Group, comprising 22 UN agencies and the World Bank, the FAO will advocate for solutions that make migration an act of choice and not a desperate last resort. Agriculture and rural development have a key role to play in this.

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Feeding the world, preserving the planet SPONSORED

different in 15 years” in terms of global nutrition.

“The world needs a balanced diet”

Awareness and new technologies are transforming the way we feed the world’s growing population affordably, while preserving the planet, says this expert.

“The most exciting development of recent years in the field of food security is awareness,” says Jai Shroff, CEO of UPL, an Indian crops solution company with presence in 124 countries. “Awareness is at least 60 per cent of victory. Sustainable agriculture is something we’ve been focused on since the 1970s and finally the whole world is talking about it.

It’s very satisfying to see multilateral organisations like the United Nations and World Bank setting sustainability goals and taking action towards them.” He’s confident that, despite the immense challenges that still lie ahead, “the world will look very

“An estimated 25 per cent reduction in wasted food could feed 800 million people. The wasted food emits 3.3 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases, contributing to global warming and climate change. It is a huge challenge.”

To achieve international Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs), Shroff says the whole world needs to work together. He believes the first key step is to introduce the technologies currently in use in developed countries to less developed nations. The next step is to develop more technologies.

Reducing water consumption, maximising the productivity of each acre of available agricultural land, introducing technology at cost-effective prices, and making nutritious food affordable to everyone, are all crucial to achieving SDGs, says Shroff.

“The world needs a balanced diet – the privileged among us can have a blood test and see where we’re deficient, but that’s not available to the poorest of the poor, who are often the world’s small farmers. Fruit and vegetables and nutritious food are not only for the elite.

Jai Shroff CEO, UPL

Keeping profits human “Over the decades, we’ve developed many technologies for small farmers and food-handling companies to reduce post-harvest losses and give food a longer, healthy shelf life. Grains can be stocked for around two years; fruit and vegetables are key to improving diet and need to be disinfected so that there’s no disease present as they go into the storage and distribution system.”

Any business needs to be profitable, says Shroff: “If food prices go down, who pays? The small farmers supplying the urban environments, who can’t afford to. We work with

about 300,000 small farmers in the north of India to help them reduce their costs by sharing technologies that the individual farmers couldn’t afford, like weather predictions and reduced use of chemicals.” The same farmers have a percentage of their land set aside for a few of their own fruit trees or cows, whose produce they can consume and share as they wish, separate from their main selling crops like rice.

Preserving nature Global health and business imperatives go hand in hand with preserving the planet, says Shroff: “I’m a big environmentalist. The world’s forests need to be preserved, they are true nature at its best. For the past 10 years, we’ve focussed intensively on reducing the environmental impact of agriculture, through both new technologies and simple measures, such as helping small farmers understand about growing the right crop in the right place. For example, sunflower and oil seed crops will grow close to the desert, but sugar is a big consumer of water.” Our water optimising technology (called Zeba) that improves irrigation is providing significant savings for farmers,

both by reducing water consumption and by storing water in the ground to keep crops alive during periods of drought.

“Zeba also improves germination,” explains Shroff, “which helps farmers avoid reseeding. We’ve achieved 30 per cent water reduction for farmers of irrigated crops, and even in field and root crops like cotton and potatoes.

“Water can also leach and contaminate subsoil water with fertilisers: our technology reduces this leaching by 75-80 per cent, and farmers don’t have to reapply fertilisers after heavy rain.”

The whole world will see huge progress in the environmental aspects of agriculture over coming years, says Shroff. “At UPL we’re very well positioned to be part of that drive because sustainability has been part of our DNA since my father set up the business in 1969.

We work with everyone, from local village chiefs to big business and governments, and we’re very excited that the world’s organisations are on the same mission.”

Read more from COO, UPL: globalcause.co.uk

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Dr Lawrence Haddad Executive Director, Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition

Why malnutrition creates a human cost and an economic burden How are different countries affected by malnutrition?

There are various forms of malnutrition. For example, there are children in the world who are not eating enough, living in unhealthy environments and not growing properly as a result. Others are not getting the right vitamins and minerals and ending up with conditions such as anaemia and goitre. Then there’s the obesity and diabetes epidemic. If we combine all three, it’s estimated that one in three people on the planet are malnourished, perhaps even one in two. Obviously, Africa and south Asian countries have bigger problems with undernutrition, whereas Europe and North America have too much of the wrong food. Half the countries in the world are dealing with both problems at the same time, which we call the ‘double burden’.

Why is malnutrition a particular issue for women and children?

Women and children are most vulnerable because they need more nutrients per kilogram of their body weight, yet they tend to have the least say in decision-making in their household and community. The period from conception to the first two years of life (a 1,000-day window) is when the immune system, brain and central nervous system are developed. So, if the foetus and baby are not getting enough nutrients, they can’t develop properly.

What are the economic consequences of malnutrition?

Many studies show that at the economy-wide level, around three to ten per cent of GDP is lost because of the burden of malnutrition. At an individual level, studies show that people who are undernourished don’t achieve as much at school, don’t get as good a job as a result and are estimated to earn a third less than their nourished counterparts.

How do food systems need to change to help solve the problem of malnutrition?

I’m encouraged that people are waking up to the importance of food systems. Previously, the talk was all about agriculture; now it’s understood that processing, storage, distribution and retailing — the action that takes place between what’s grown and what’s eaten — is vital too.

The food system is only meeting the needs of — at best – twothirds of the global population, and that’s not good enough. But it’s not surprising because businesses are set up to maximise profit, not nutritional outcomes. That isn’t a criticism because, in generating profits, businesses also generate jobs and taxes. But quite frequently they’re also producing foods that are too low in nutrition. Governments need to set rules that promote nutrition with a system of sticks and carrots. Sticks might be fines for code violations or taxes on unhealthy food. Carrots could be lower taxes — or subsidies — for businesses that promote the production, processing and distribution of foods that are part of a healthy diet, such as fruit and vegetables, pulses and nuts.

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It’s about more than hunger

Malnutrition continues to prevent individuals, families and nations from progressing but solutions are achievable.

By Kate Sharma

I

f you look at the top-line figures on global malnutrition, things appear to be moving in the right direction: overall UN statistics show that the proportion of undernourished people worldwide has reduced from 15 per cent in 20002002 to 11 per cent in 2014-20161.

Delve a little deeper and the situation becomes a lot of more complicated. Today, nearly one in three people globally suffer from at least one form of malnutrition: wasting, stunting, vitamin and mineral deficiency, excess weight or obesity and diet-related, non-communicable diseases. Current progress is insufficient to reach the World Health Assembly

targets set for 2025 and the Sustainable Development Goals set for 2030.

Double burden of malnutrition “The Sustainable Development Goals indicate that we need to address all forms of malnutrition,” explains Dr Francesco Branca, Director of the Department of Nutrition for Health and Development at the World Health Organization. “While we have seen a decrease in stunting we have seen an increase in all other forms of malnutrition, including childhood obesity and mineral and vitamin deficiencies leading to anaemia.”

There are now nearly 41 million overweight children globally, an

increase of 11 million since 20002. The most rapid growth has been seen in middle-income countries, many of which face the combined challenge of tackling both undernutrition and obesity along with subsequent diet-related, non-communicable diseases.

South Asia is a case in point: more than half of the 52 million children who experience wasting as a result of hunger live in southern Asia. The situation is so bad that it constitutes a public health crisis. At the same time, the region is also dealing with a dramatic increase in obesity, with the number of overweight children under five having increased from 5 million in 2000 to 7.9 million in 20163.

eEconomic impact nThe developmental, economic, fsocial and medical impacts of the global burden of malnutrition are serious and lasting. “A healthy diet tis a top risk factor for the burden of edisease,” continues Dr Branca. “Poor nutrition not only affects individual capacity, it impacts the potential of whole countries.”

Tackling this ever-evolving monster is a huge challenge, recognised by the UN General Assembly, which edeclared a Decade of Action on hNutrition4 to run from 2016 to 2025. hIt’s the first time that nutrition has featured so prominently on the global political agenda. .

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28 July 2017, Morroa Municipality, Cambimba village, Colombia

United solutions

Dr Francesco Branca Director, Department of Nutrition for Health and Development, World Health Organization

“Today, nearly one in three people globally suffer from at least one form of malnutrition”

While the issues are complex, the solutions are largely the same. “We need to shift our thinking from the concept of food security to the concept of nutrition security,” says Dr Branca. “It’s not just the quantity of food we are providing, but also the quality. We need to consider this from an early age, taking into account maternal nutrition, breastfeeding and childhood diets.

“Many countries are taking action. We’ve seen governments taking responsibility for food value chains, implementing incentives to leverage action and policies that shape the price of food through taxation,” says Dr Branca. “We still

have a lot to do, but I am optimistic.”

FAO/IFAD/UNICEF/WFP/WHO. The state of food security and nutrition in the world 2017. Building resilience for peace and food security, available at: http://www.who.int/ nutrition/en/

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UNICEF/ WHO/ World Bank Group. Joint Child Malnutrition Estimates. Key findings of the 2017 edition.

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3 UNICEF/ WHO/ World Bank Group. Joint Chil Malnutrition Estimates. Key findings of the 2017 edition, available at http://www.who. int/nutrition/publications/en/

http://www.who.int/nutrition/decade-ofaction/en/

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Phil Hogan EU Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development

Tackling global food insecurity - the European answer To meet the challenge of rising global hunger, Europe needs to lead from the front in developing new solutions, writes Phil Hogan, EU Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development.

Is global hunger on the rise?

Global hunger is on the rise – again. After a steady decline in the number of chronically undernourished people from about 900 million in 2000 to 777 million in 2015, the numbers went up in 2016. The United Nations’ recent world food security report is sobering: last year, 815 million people faced serious hunger.

This is 38 million more people than in 2015 – an increase that is the equivalent of the population of Canada or more than half the population of the UK.

How can trade make a difference?

Globally, we promote multilateralism, continuing to advocate for a trading system that is open, rules-based and fair trade. The EU remains, by far, the world’s largest importer of agricultural products from Least Developed Countries (LDCs) – up to €3.4 billion in 2016. We import more from LDCs than the US, China, Japan, Russia and Canada combined.

Food security is also at the centre of EU support programmes in developing countries, like the €25 million “Fit for Market” programme, which assists local producers and farmers’ organisations in accessing domestic and international vegetable markets.

How can we tackle food insecurity on the ground?

We need to boost investment in LDCs to give them the tools to tackle food insecurity themselves. Take Africa: with a population expected to double by 2050 from 1.2 billion people to 2.4 billion (predominantly young) people, the continent needs to create 18 million new jobs each year up to 2035.

The agri-food sector is central to achieving food security in Africa, but also crucially important for its capacity to provide jobs and growth in rural areas, thus tackling one of the root causes of irregular migration. This is why Europe is advocating for responsible agri-food investment in Africa, investments that avoid land grabbing, pay a decent return to farmers and recognise their central role in the food value chain.

Read the extended Q&A on globalcause.co.uk

Agricultural diversity needed to meet global hunger needs

By Kate Sharma Climate change, war, natural disasters, deforestation, land use change, pests and diseases threaten the crop diversity that will ensure we can feed our growing population.

Hunger remains one of the world’s greatest challenges. Last month, the United Nations announced that hunger is once again on the rise and now affects 11 per cent of the world’s population. The global population is expected to reach nine billion by 2050, which will lead to further challenges in stemming the rise of hunger.

Our challenge isn’t just the sheer number of people we have to feed.

Agricultural systems are vulnerable to climate change, including more frequent, extreme weather events, which is already reducing yields.

Climate change not only batters our crops but also threatens the crop diversity that could, in the long term, provide the key to feeding the world.

Building blocks of agriculture “Crop diversity provides the building blocks of agriculture,” explains Marie Haga, Executive Director of the Crop Trust. “Every variety encodes its own special traits in its genetic makeup. Some traits allow the crop to withstand higher temperatures or drought, other traits provide greater nutritional value. When the climate changes faster than plants can adapt, we can lose varieties, forever.”

We have, in the past decades, pursued an intensification of our agricultural systems that has helped to feed the world, but that has come at an environmental price and may not be sustainable. In the process, we have lost both crop diversity and knowledge. In many places around the world, the diverse farming systems of old have been replaced by more productive, but in many cases less sustainable, monocultures of limited numbers of varieties.

Time is not on our side. Buried among the dozens of targets of the Sustainable Development Goal is Target 2.5, which aims to promote sustainable agriculture and maintain genetic diversity of seeds – by 2020.

“This illustrates how urgent it is to safeguard crop diversity,” says Ms Haga. “If we preserve crop diversity, we can use conventional breeding

Marie Haga Executive Director, the Crop Trust

techniques to develop new varieties that are adapted to new circumstances. Right now, our job is to safeguard what crop diversity we still have, both in farmers’ fields and in genebanks.”

Safeguarding diversity While crop diversity is at risk, all is not lost: it is also being protected, by farmers in many parts of the world, and in collections maintained in genebanks. There are about 1,750 genebanks in the world, which store and preserve the diversity of our food crops, mainly in the form of seeds. But these banks are not museums, where seeds can be admired but not touched.

They are more like public libraries, distributing the diversity in their care to breeders, researchers, and indeed farmers. Crop diversity gives them opportunities to develop and cultivate plants that are more nutritious, tolerate higher temperatures, use less water, withstand higher soil salinity and are more resistant to new pests and diseases. Plants, in other words, that are future-ready.

Many of the world’s genebanks, however, are vulnerable, not only to natural catastrophes and war, but to lack of funding or inadequate management. The Crop Trust is working with partners to create and fund a global system to guarantee the conservation and availability of the genetic diversity in genebanks, thus unleashing their potential and promoting their use.

This system includes international genebanks, national genebanks and the world’s global back-up facility for our agricultural heritage – the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. The Seed Vault is located on a remote island in the Svalbard archipelago, halfway between mainland Norway and the North Pole. Its creation in 2008

was a global success for the future of agriculture.

“It’s like a safety deposit box for the whole world’s agriculture,” explains Ms Haga. “The dream is to have a copy of every genebank sample in the world in Svalbard.”

The facility has already proved invaluable. Starting in 2008, the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) made several deposits. When war broke out in Syria, ICARDA genebank managers withdrew a selection of seeds from Svalbard to restart their conservation work at new facilities in Morocco and Lebanon. The samples were regenerated and then returned to Svalbard this year in two deposits.

Syria is not unique; crops are being lost because of conflicts in many other parts of the world. In time, farmers in these regions will require the opportunities crop diversity provides to restart agriculture and, at the same time, improve crop production.

Technological opportunities Advances in technology also offer tremendous opportunities for agricultural researchers and scientists to access the knowledge stored in genebanks across the world. “With modern technology, it’s reasonably cheap to sequence genomes and manage the resulting big data,” says Ms Haga. “Each variety has distinct traits someone might be looking for, but it’s a hugely underutilised resource at the moment, because we don’t have enough data on each sample.”

To develop this global system of conservation to its full potential will take not only financial investment but also a renewed global appreciation of the role that agricultural diversity plays in feeding the planet. We must act to ensure that agriculture is robust and resilient enough to produce nutritious crops well adapted to a regime of fewer inputs, and more challanges. In the struggle to ensure food security, everyone has a role to play. By spreading the word about the importance of crop diversity, and lobbying governments and private sector leaders to commit to the conservation efforts of genebanks, we take a massive step towards ensuring our children’s children’s food will be secure.

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Svalbard global seed vault: “A safety deposit box for the whole world’s agriculture.”

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Crop diversity at risk: Crops are being lost because of conflicts in the world.

Inspiring global ownership for food insecurity

By Kate Sharma

The global problem of food insecurity will only be addressed when collaboration extends to include the farmers on the front line.

“So many different stakeholders are involved, not only governments, but UN agencies, private sector, international financial and research institutions, civil society organisations and farmers, and NGOs,” explains Amira Gornass, outgoing Chair of the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS). “We have to make sure that the voices of all the stakeholders, especially those furthest left behind, are heard.”

The stakeholders Ms Gornass refers to include UN agencies like the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the World Food Programme (WFP), but also representatives of farmers who are, even now, struggling to feed their communities amid rapidly changing climatic, economic, social, environmental and political landscapes.

Collaboration and co-ordination

are undoubtedly the only ways with which to approach such global issues, but such issues are clearly not without their difficulties. “The challenge is striking the balance between inclusivity and effectiveness,” continues Ms Gornass. “Building consensus takes a long time and more emphasis needs to be given to working with local smallholder farmers. It’s these localised approaches that lead to sustainable, long-term solutions.”

Securing ownership According to CFS, smallholders supply 70 per cent of overall food production, and yet ensuring that they are represented in discussions and benefit from the policy frameworks is one of the greatest challenges that needs to be addressed if we are to reduce food insecurity and improve levels of nutrition.

One example is the 2015 Framework for Action for Food Security and Nutrition in Protracted Crises. Following extensive consultation with a wide base of stakeholders, the document provides a framework that can be used by everyone who may have a role in improving or impacting food

Her Excellency Amira Gornass Ambassador of Sudan to FAO, IFAD and WFP and outgoing Chair of the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS)

implemented,” explains Ms Gornass.

Governments have an essential role to play in engaging smallholder farmers and, during her tenure as Chair of CFS, Ms Gornass has devoted considerable time to working at the regional and national levels to reach the smallholder famers. “Just last week, I was in Côte d’Ivoire sharing our policy recommendations on connecting smallholders to markets,” says Ms Gornass. “This will help them improve their productivity and production of food and ultimately improve nutrition and reduce food insecurity.”

Empowering women security and nutrition in countries experiencing periods of prolonged crisis.

While the framework may provide best practices, there is no obligation to apply them, which is why it’s vital that key stakeholders, including farmers, are part of the process of policy development from the outset. “When people own the policies themselves, we have a much greater chance of seeing them

Another issue that CFS has sought to address is the empowerment of women. Women make an essential contribution to agriculture across the world.

The FAO estimates that roughly 43 per cent of the agricultural labour force in developing countries is female and yet it is estimated that 60 per cent of the world’s chronically hungry people are women and girls. Women also face a greater challenge in accessing markets and securing benefits, technology, finance and education.

Research shows that when women are empowered and have as equal access as men to productive and financial resources, income opportunities, education and services, there is a consequent increase in agricultural output and a significant reduction in the number of poor and hungry people. It’s not just access to resources that Ms Gornass is advocating for women.

“We empower women by providing a platform for participation and including them in the whole decision-making process. Assisting women’s access to productive resources is usually reflected in the condition of their families and the wider community.”

The problem of food insecurity is complex and the need is urgent.

While collaboration and coordination can be challenging, these are the only ways to address such a multi-faceted problem.

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Eating salmon supports a healthy heart

Both farmed salmon & wild salmon are highly nutritious & delicious

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Fishing for sustainable foods SPONSORED

As global populations and wealth rise quickly, so too, does the demand for protein, but land-based sources are reaching the limits of sustainable production.

Instead, the food system is moving from land to sea as the future of food is increasingly seen to lie beneath the waves...

But can it be sustainable?

One of the biggest issues facing the food system is how we can balance the growing demand for an increase in production of animal protein, and the stresses that production places on the environment. By 2050, when the population is set to hit nine billion, the World Resources Institute predicts there will be a 70 per cent gap between food supply and growing demand, and there is simply not enough arable land or water for traditional agriculture to bridge the gap. Past initiatives to dramatically increase land productivity, such as the green revolution, came with a significant environmental cost.

While it did increase food production,

the intensive farming approach led to the increased use of fertilisers and pesticides and release of greenhouse gases. The oceans can help, but wild fisheries are already at or beyond their limits. The solution, therefore, seems to increasingly lie in fish farming.

Aquaculture is intrinsically less harmful to the environment than landbased protein production and plays an important role in helping protect wild fisheries from depletion. However, it is not without environmental risk and needs to be done right - that is what the Global Salmon Initiative is about.

“The big question is straightforward: how are we going to feed ourselves?” says Avrim Lazar, the Convenor of the Global Salmon Initiative (GSI). The GSI is a leadership initiative in the farmed salmon sector, established by CEOs from around the world, including Norway, Canada, Chile and Scotland, which aims to significantly improve the sustainability performance of the industry - i.e. to produce more food at less environmental cost.

Farmed salmon is one of the healthiest seafood choices, and with its high Omega-3 content, salmon is an especially nutritious protein. “A rapidly growing salmon farming sector is part of the answer, but, if the industry is to meet its potential, we need to continue to further improve our environmental game. That needs to happen at scale, and at speed,” added Lazar.

To drive change at scale and speed, GSI members have decided to share environmental know-how across

Avrim Lazar Convener, GSI

companies. While still aggressively competing with each other on all other matters, the rule for addressing environmental issues is pre-competitive collaboration. They are sharing their expertise, research and breakthroughs and, a result, solutions are found more quickly and new techniques are adopted more widely, thus raising the bar for the whole industry rather than just a few. To Lazar, creating this unique model of cooperation has a benefit outside discussing the immediate challenges facing the industry. “It’s surprisingly rare in any sector,” he says, “to have a table around which CEOs can exchange information and ideas with their peers in a safe and neutral pre-competitive setting. As well as dealing with sustainability we’re also creating a community with a shared sense of responsibility.

Jason Clay, Senior Vice President in charge of markets at the WWF, is also particularly keen to support

initiatives that lift the poorest environmental players across an entire sector rather than making a few good ones even better. “GSI is an interesting model as the best performers realised that the whole industry is going to be judged by newspaper headlines and social media, and that they had to work together if they were to move the bottom ones up.”

To ensure progress in the right direction, GSI members have adopted the most stringent of environmental standards, The Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC), as their reference point for environmental and social performance. They have made it their goal to be 100 per cent certified by 2020. To ensure accountability, all members are publishing their sustainability performance results annually via an online sustainability report. “Getting people’s confidence is extremely important,” says Sady Delgado, CEO of Los Fiordos and GSI member. “The only way to do that is through transparency, which is why we publish all our data online and use this as a marker of our progress towards improved sustainability.”

With more than half the global industry participating in GSI, the potential for wide scale change in sustainability is enormous.

Recognising the potential of working pre-competitively, the current focus areas for the GSI members are: ensuring the future sustainability of food resources, and improving disease management. Focuses may change

with time, as industry priorities shift, but the central mission is core: increasing the eco-efficiency of farming while minimising any impact on ocean ecosystems and ensuring a healthy product.

In addition to sharing of knowledge, there have been many other benefits too. Companies taking part have seen an immediate return on their reputational capital, and because the public tends to think of the salmon industry as a whole rather than divided into individual companies, this has boosted the whole industry’s standing. Most importantly, it has induced a certain pride among members in being part of a group that is quite simply doing the right thing; it keeps them engaged and committed to the project. For an industry often located in remote areas, an improved reputation is also appealing to bright young graduates who want to work in ethically attuned industries. “There is a real motivational force in being part of a gang who gets it – and is doing the right thing,” Lazar noted.

Impressive as this shift in thinking is from the salmon industry, it is not enough to address the challenges to our food system. What we need is more sectors to follow the example of the GSI: setting the bar high and working together to achieve speedy results.

Our future and the future of the planet depends on it. globalsalmoninitiative. org

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Bringing Home the Cost of a Plate of Food THE COST OF A PLATE OF FOOD

The amount residents of New York State would have to pay for a simple plate of food if they spent the same proportion of their daily income* as people in these selected countries 2016

Further information * Daily budget for New York State based on GDP per capita estimates from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). For comparison with countries where national GDP figures are not available, or when the Plate of Food Index refers to a selected area of a monitored country, BEA’s 2016 personal income estimate for New York State is used as an alternative income measure. New York State’s daily GDP per capita was US$207.79 and its personal income US$165.85 in 2016. ** Due to unavailability of vegetable oil prices, relative quantities of other food components were adjusted to maintain the same caloric content of the meal without oil. † Daily budget estimated from per capita remittance inflows and wage rates for non-qualified labour adjusted for the number of working days per week and number of economically dependent individuals within a typical household. To ensure comparability, the BEA figure for New York personal income was used in this case. †† Personal income estimates for Adamawa, Borno, Jigawa and Yobe provided by 2016 Food Security and Vulnerability Survey.

$1.20

New York, USA

$4.71

Jordan

$5.50

Indonesia

$8.15

Iran

$8.27

Guatemala

$8.90

Armenia

$9.09

Egypt

$9.25

India

$9.34

Philippines

$11.21

El Salvador

$11.25

Bangladesh

$12.19

State of Palestine

$13.08

Nicaragua

$13.91

Djibouti

$14.51

Kenya

$14.61

Myanmar

$15.86

Pakistan

$18.20

Laos

$24.22

Republic of Congo

$27.73

Tanzania **

$27.77

Nepal

$28.44

Guinea

$30.06

Uganda

$30.55

Tajikistan

$42.12 $46.30 $53.38

While someone living in New York might spend just 0.6% of their daily income on the ingredients to make a simple bean stew, someone in South Sudan would need to spend 155% of their daily income

Somalia Yemen, urban The Gambia

$61.92

Mozambique

$72.65

Haiti

Learn more online with The Relative Cost of a Plate of Food map globalcause.co.uk

Democratic Republic of Congo

$82.10

Malawi

$94.43

Deir Ezzor, Syria †

$190.11

Nigeria, North-East ††

$200.32

South Sudan

$321.70

How much do YOU pay for a plate of food?

In developing countries, food is costly. For years now, World Food Programme (WFP) economists and statisticians have shown how the price – not just the shortage – of food often can explain why hunger is so hard to beat. Conflict, market distortions, disrupted supply chains, poor governance and climate challenges, among others, contribute to the problem.

As we at WFP continued to work on this issue of affordability, our

teams came up with the idea of a global index that would show the relative cost of a basic plate of food against a single baseline. To enable people to relate to what something truly costs, in terms of one’s purchasing power, we shifted the focus from the nominal price to the price as perceived by those who would purchase the product.

The results of our research are, in many cases, staggering: if you thought that a meal was expensive

in, say, Norway – well, try Malawi.

More directly, consider this counter-intuitive fact: once income differentials are accounted for, food that might cost you as little US$1.20 in New York would set you back US$321 in South Sudan.

You aren’t alone if that shocks you.

I could hear gasps in the audience at a UN General Assembly event in September 2017 when I cited those figures. Hearing them changes one’s perspective, shining a stark light on

David Beasley Executive Director, World Food Programme and former Republican Governor of South Carolina

just how difficult it is for so many to simply purchase food for themselves and their families.

Over the coming months, as we continue to provide both emergency and systemic food assistance around the world, we hope to expand our index beyond the current 33 nations.

If we are serious about reaching Zero Hunger, the first step is knowing how far we must travel.

Counting the beans Q: How did you get idea for the Plate of Food index?

A: People think hunger is about lack of food. But very often, hunger is about lack of money. The trouble is that food systems are very complex things, and they are riddled with disruptors – political, economic, climate-related. These make food much more expensive relative to people’s incomes in developing countries.

We hope we’ve found a graphic, affecting way to convey to people in rich countries just how exorbitant e. food prices can be to someone in the developing world.

Q: So how does the index work?

A: The index says: while a New Yorker might expect to spend just 0.6 percent of their daily income on the ingredients to make a simple 600 kilocalorie bean stew, someone in South Sudan would need to spend as much as 155 percent of their income.

Or, to approach it from the other end, it would be as if a New Yorker were to pay US$321 for their stew.

We took New York as a baseline, but you would find a similar chasm in affordability with pretty much any other developed market.

Q: What was the process of developing the index?

Arif Husain Chief Economist, World Food Programme

A: We put together a simple standard meal – beans or other pulses, paired with a staple carbohydrate that reflects local preferences in each country. The cost of the ingredients for a single serving was calculated in the national currency of each country covered. Then we derived an average daily budget per person from national GDP data – or, where this was unavailable or unreliable, from other data sources. Once we had the meal-to-income ratio, we determined a theoretical price by

retrospectively applying this ratio to the daily budget of a New York consumer.

Q: Beyond the mathematical model, what does the index tell us?

A: That the pricing of food is profoundly skewed in many places. That access to food is therefore profoundly unequal. And that our top task – and by “us” I mean the world’s – is to work on multiple fronts to make food markets functional, efficient and resilient, if the scourge of hunger is to be eradicated by 2030.

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INSPIRATION

COLUMN

Peter Wobst Senior Programme Adviser for the Strategic Programme on Rural Poverty Reduction, FAO

Do young people hold the key to rural development?

M

ost of the world’s poorest people live in rural areas, so creating opportunities for young people there needs to be a priority.

The world’s population is expected to grow to almost 10 billion by 2050, mainly driven by population growth in developing countries. More food is needed to feed this growing population, yet development within agriculture and rural economies is stagnant. Every year, millions of young people are joining the labour force in rural areas facing daunting challenges. Supply of labour outstrips demand and so young people are leaving rural communities in their droves. What they often leave behind are ageing smallholders who are less likely to embrace technology and more likely to maintain the status quo, perpetuating rural poverty and poor working practices.

Three quarters of the world’s poor live in rural areas and the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN (FAO) estimates that 70-90 per cent of those who are occupied within agriculture are part of the informal economy – with no access to workers’ rights, social support, basic safety or a regular wage.

Releasing potential Peter Wobst, Senior Programme Adviser for the Strategic Programme on Rural Poverty Reduction at FAO, wants to turn this hopeless situation on its head. “What we have is a large, untapped reservoir of employment opportunities in agri-food systems,” he says. “If you provide young people with skills and resources, you create more jobs, more viable opportunities and impact decisions at a higher level.”

The international community has recognised the great potential of rural youth. In July, the G20 announced its Initiative for Rural Youth Employment in Hamburg, another international mechanism to give young people better opportunities. But, as Mr. Wobst points out: “We need more action on the ground with national governments promoting inclusive policies, complemented with targeted investments in rural development, to create an enabling environment for rural youth employment.”

National approach The FAO is working to help governments invest not only in new technologies, but also in human capital, so young people have the necessary skills to productively contribute to the agricultural sector and the development of rural communities.

Another major challenge affecting youth development is the persistence of child labour in rural areas. At the moment, more than 70 per cent of all child labour is found in agriculture, affecting 108 million children. This is a key consideration that needs to be addressed as part of wider policies on rural youth employment.

Senegal is just one of a number of countries where the government has made a commitment to adopt a National Rural Youth Employment Policy in order to create 100,000 to 150,000 jobs a year. The success of the project will depend on large-scale investment in the form of public-private partnerships along with the development of grass-roots entrepreneurship schemes

Equipping food producers with “the right knowledge and innovations”

By Tony Greenway Global hunger levels are rising for the first time in years, so it’s essential to grow nutritious food in a sustainable way. That means promoting knowledge and embracing innovation.

Our current food system is responsible for more than a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions, cautions Dr Shenggen Fan, Director-General of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). So when it comes to food production, we need to create more with less: less water, less energy, less land and fewer carbon emissions.

Yet focusing on food quantity is not enough, he argues. It’s imperative to focus on quality too; which is why the world needs a sustainable system that protects the environment and produces enough healthy, nutritious food for everyone. “It’s not acceptable that we continue to have so many hungry and undernourished people in today’s world,” says Fan. “While we have to produce and consume food in a more sustainable way, nutrition and health must be part of the equation.”

Innovation in food production For this to happen, we need to embrace technological innovation.

For example, some biotechnology breakthroughs in food production — such as genetic engineering — may sound promising but face hurdles in the form of regulations, restrictions and, perhaps most important of all, consumer acceptance. “That is why we need to empower citizens to understand the potential of innovative technologies,” says Fan. “If we do, it may help us produce more food — and more nutritious food —

Dr Shenggen Fan Director-General, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

Take ‘cultured’ meat, which is grown in a laboratory from animal cells. “Obviously this presents lots of challenges, but could have a positive impact on the environment, nutrition, health and employment,” says Fan. “I’m not promoting this method. I’m just suggesting we should look at the opportunity it represents — and its potential drawbacks. It’s one to watch.”

Factors that increase hunger levels It’s incumbent upon every citizen of the world — not just political leaders — to help eliminate malnutrition and hunger, insists Fan. “We can all push the political system to effect change. But in order to do so we need knowledge and data so that we can track and monitor our progress and hold our politicians to account.

That’s vital.”

For example, this month, the IFPRI published its annual Global Hunger Index, which highlights successes and failures in world hunger reduction. Unfortunately, notes Fan, the Index shows that hunger levels are rising for the first time in several years; so despite

momentum can be lost without food systems that are both resilient and sustainable. Some countries in conflict zones are of particular concern to him, such as South Sudan, Somalia, northern Nigeria and Yemen. “There is an increased correlation between conflict and hunger,” says Fan. “Political turmoil, the refugee crisis, climate change — all these factors can come together to create the perfect storm that increases hunger levels.”

Knowledge is a vital resource Yet he is cautiously optimistic, too, because many countries on the Index are making good progress, including Vietnam, Senegal, Ethiopia and Bangladesh. “Bangladesh in particular has done a wonderful job in improving its food system resilience by, for example, building irrigation and drainage systems and establishment of a social safety net, so that there is a way to deal with weather shocks when they occur.”

The message about the benefits of a sustainable food system is slowly getting through. Yet more needs to be done. “In some countries, there’s a trade-off between sustainability and hunger reduction,” says Fan. “Of course we have to recognise that smallholders in developing countries need to produce food to feed their families; but if they aren’t equipped with the right knowledge and innovations and if policies are not right, they will continue to degrade the soil with inorganic material and use more water than necessary, and they could become part of the problem.”

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PHOTO: A GATES FOUNDATION “ACCELERATOR” - THE POWER OF NUTRITION AND PARTNERS

The power of nutrition: accelerating progress against a cruel social injustice

By Martin Short, CEO, The Power of Nutrition SPONSORED

It is a simple but devastating fact that the nutrition a child receives in their first 1,000 days can change the course of their entire life. This is a cruel social injustice that hides in plain sight. It may seem obvious that babies and young children need the right nutrients to grow.

But the long-term effects are much more significant, and longer-lasting, than the underdevelopment of a child’s body.

Undernutrition leads to slower physical and mental growth of the body and brain, causing long-term damage to a child’s health, and the opportunities they may have throughout their life.

Undernutrition is one of the biggest killers of children in the world today – leading to nearly half of childhood

Nearly one in four children under the age of five are stunted, with diminished physical and mental capacities. As a result, tens of millions of children living today across Africa and Asia face the prospect of diminished, stunted futures. This is a vicious cycle that holds back generation after generation.

Such a vicious cycle cannot be broken by governments, philanthropists and civil society alone or by a global community that works in silos. It requires everyone working in concert towards systemic and sustainable solutions. It requires enlightened governments, private sector capital working in harmony with development funds, innovative thinking and a new kind of mindset.

The Power of Nutrition was created in 2015 to help fill this need by turning towards the private sector as a source of funding for nutrition. With support from our founders (the UK Government’s Department for International Development, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, the UBS Optimus Foundation, UNICEF and the World Bank), we leverage every dollar we raise four times to invest in programmes in some of the countries where the need is greatest.

“Nutrition is the biggest missed opportunity in global health.”

Bill Gates

“Stunting is a cruel social injustice that hides in plain sight.”

Martin Short

In two years, with partners in government and the private sector, The Power of Nutrition has already invested almost $190 million in the futures of children in Ethiopia, Liberia, Tanzania and Madagascar. Each programme is based on collaboration between a specific combination of private sector funders (including corporates, philanthropies and highnet-worth individuals), bilateral and

This unique and highly targeted approach to bringing together private and public sector funders is the reason why The Power of Nutrition was recently named as an “accelerator” of progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The Gates Foundation selected as accelerators a group of “high-level partnerships [that] catalyse substantial progress … through a combination of investment, expertise, and innovation,” towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs, also known as the Global Goals). This dynamic combination of partnership, expertise and innovation exactly defines The Power of Nutrition.

By missing out on the vital nutrients they need in their first 1,000 days of life, undernourished children live with the effects for the rest of their lives. As do their families, their communities and the countries where they live. Stunted children (with underdeveloped bodies for their age) have stunted brains that limit everything they do. As these children grow up, a stunted workforce creates a stunted economy, cutting GDP by as much as 11 per cent.

Investing in nutrition is one of the

develop. Studies have shown a return of as much as $16 for every $1 spent on nutrition. As Bill Gates has said, this is one of the most cost-effective interventions in development today.

But very little money is invested in this critical area; only around 1 per cent of all global aid is spent on nutrition, making it one of the most poorly funded areas in development.

The Power of Nutrition currently has a pipeline of investments worth as much as $250 million in life-changing investments to build a better future for children in Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, India and Rwanda.

This will move us towards our target of $1 billion in new investments for nutrition.

As one of the fastest-growing foundations in Europe, The Power of Nutrition offers great opportunities for new investments in nutrition. Thinking and acting like an investment house, we combine rigour and an innovative financing mechanism to deliver supercharged funding for an underfunded sector and systemic change where and when it is needed.

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INSPIRATION

Cheryl McGechie Director of Public Engagement, the Fairtrade Foundation

Don’t feed exploitation What you put in your weekly shopping basket has never been more important if we are to address global food insecurity.

For the first time in a decade the UN has reported an increase in hunger around the world. The report states that 815 million people were hungry in 2016, 38 million more than the previous year. Climate change and an increase in conflict across the globe are cited as two of the major contributing factors. However, while war rages and storms wreak havoc, communities can be strengthened to withstand the impact.

Empowering farmers The Fairtrade movement has been active for around 25 years, securing a minimum price for goods purchased from farmers in developing nations along with the provision of additional premiums to bolster community resilience.

“There are clear links between food security and Fairtrade,” says Cheryl McGechie, Director of Public Engagement at the Fairtrade Foundation. “We help farmers get a more sustainable income so they can feed their families and invest in things like clean water. Farmers are also democratically organised to spend money within their communities on things like education, healthcare facilities and to improve farming mechanisms.”

Building strong communities Ms McGechie believes that the Fairtrade system gives communities not only the resources to feed themselves and their families on a day-to-say basis, but also enables them to survive times of uncertainty and instability. Cocoa and coffee famers, who live on a largely hand-to-mouth basis, frequently have to endure periods of low productivity, which are often characterised by hunger. “With Fairtrade, farmers can save both food and money to help them get through these periods,” explains Ms McGechie. “In some cases we’ve seen farmers who are up to a third better off.”

Market tension Sales of Fairtrade products have continued to grow and awareness remains good – 78 per cent of people felt favourably towards the movement it in a recent survey. Despite all the challenges and turbulence of the past year, which have seen the grocery market contract and the pound plummet, shoppers are still supporting Fairtrade to deliver a better deal for the farmers who grow some of our favourite ingredients.

Growth in some of our most iconic products, such as bananas and coffee, have continued, while new additions show the continued desire to make trade fair. Gold continues to grow from its small beginnings while more and more shoppers are raising a glass to Fairtrade wines. Importing, in general, is now more expensive and, with the added Fairtrade premiums on top, many businesses are feeling the pinch.

All this uncertainty only fuels the argument for consumers to shop more wisely. “When you buy Fairtrade, you’re not just giving a better deal to farmers, you’re sending a clear message to businesses too,” concludes Ms McGechie.

The Fairtrade movement was largely born from community campaigners exerting their purchasing power; as global inequality continues to grow, the way we shop has never been more important.

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Training your child’s sweet tooth: We innately prefer sweet tastes, like fruit. Vegetables, which can seem bitter at first, can take some getting used to.

Good habits start young

By Kate Sharma

The first 1,000 days, from a woman’s pregnancy to her child’s second birthday, are seminal in the future health and wellbeing of a child.

“As a baby’s brain develops it needs different nutrients at different stages,” explains Anna Taylor, OBE, Executive Director, Food Foundation. With this in mind, the nutritional intake of the mother will have huge bearing on the health of her child not only when it is born, but well into the future.

However, many children today are at an increased risk of chronic disease and obesity in adulthood, simply because their mothers are not eating the right foods.

Guidelines already exist, but it seems they are not enough. Breastfeeding is one example. While the benefits are well documented, according to data published in the Lancet, the UK has one of the lowest rates in the world, with less than one per cent of mothers breastfeeding at twelve months. “We really haven’t worked out how we should package UK policy around maternal and early childhood nutrition,” continues Ms Taylor.

“While the science underscores the need, we need more investment and policies.”

Training our taste buds

Over the past few years we’ve certainly seen a greater focus on healthy eating, with legislation being put in place to improve nutrition in schools. This is certainly important, but it may be too little too late. Ms Taylor believes that good habits need to be instilled

Anna Taylor, OBE Executive Director, Food Foundation

much earlier, and it’s not simply a case of training ourselves to do what’s right; we also need to train our taste buds.

“We have an innate preference for sweet flavours,” explains Ms Taylor. “Often children need repeated exposure to different tastes. We have to work at getting young children to try things that aren’t sweet.”

The Food Foundation cites evidence that introducing vegetables as first tastes helps infants to enjoy a range of flavours, which, in turn, helps them make better food choices later in life. The temptation is often to mix bitter tasting vegetables with fruit purees to make them more palatable, but this does nothing to help children develop a broad range of tastes.

The illusion of choice

All these contributing factors really come to a head when children start to make choices for themselves later in life. “Within the wider food environment everything is geared

toward unhealthily eating. We are under the illusion that we have choice, but everything is nudging us in one direction,” explains Ms Taylor. “From the advertisements they see on the bus, to the way that foods are placed in canteens and supermarkets, and even the fact that unhealthy foods are about a three times cheaper than healthy ones.”

The soft approach to improving our nutritional intake hasn’t worked. Ms. Taylor argues that while, “everyone knows that we need to eat five portions of fruit or vegetables a day, there has been little change in our consumption over the past few years.” There are also huge inequalities in food consumption with the poorest households purchasing well below the recommended intake of fruit and vegetables portions per day.

To support these families in particular, we need a more concerted effort to put in place policies which support healthy living.

Policy can bring change

Policy has certainly been proven to affect change on a local level. The UK has successfully persuaded food manufacturers to reduce the salt content of products; Amsterdam has brought down obesity rates by working on early years, schools and urban planning.

These success stories are evidence that change is possible, but no country has yet reversed the rapid rise of obesity. As poor nutrition continues to blight our future, perhaps it’s time we looked to make changes right from the start.

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Why it’s crucial for babies to eat a varied diet from first weaning

By Tony Greenway ADVERTORIAL

The nutrition a baby receives in their first 1,000 days is scientifically proven to influence their development and health in later life.

Danone Early Life Nutrition’s Cow and Gate brand has been feeding babies for more than 100 years and its team know what a critical period weaning is.

Quality of ingredients

The first 1,000 days of a child’s life — that’s the time from conception through to toddlerhood — are a key window of development. It is why it is important for babies to discover new tastes and textures throughout their weaning journey. We spoke to the team at Danone Early Life Nutrition about the importance of weaning and why – when it comes to a baby’s food – science and behaviour should be at the heart of parents’ weaning journey with their little ones.

The type of food a baby needs depends on its age. From zero to six months, exclusive breast feeding is best and from around six months foods can be gradually introduced. Because of the small size of their stomachs, however, there’s a limit to what a baby can eat; so it’s important to ensure that the food they receive is varied and contains only high-quality ingredients.

It is important for babies to consume a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Babies have an innate preference for sweet tastes from birth, Danone Early Life Nutrition food experts say. From a scientific point of view, a baby’s reluctance to try single veggies is

entirely understandable. It’s why they’ll readily accept, say, banana purée but pull a face when offered broccoli purée. The broccoli is a completely new and bitter flavour, so the trick is to get them used to it. In order to hero these vegetable flavours, Cow & Gate foods’ underwent a renovation project where they removed all fruit and fruit juice concentrate from their savoury jars to ensure they were not masking vegetable flavours with sweetness.

Danone Early Life nutrition’s dietitians therefore believe giving babies single-flavour vegetables from the very start of weaning may help develop healthier eating habits because, if a baby starts to love their veggies, there’s a strong likelihood that they will continue to eat them in later life.

Keep persevering with veg In addition it is also important to vary the types of veg a baby receives.

And although it can be hugely frustrating when a spoon of broccoli purée keeps being rejected, frazzled parents should bear in mind that

the weaning process can offer a window of opportunity to shape a child’s taste preferences — which is why perseverance is so essential.

Indeed research in collaboration with Danone Early Life Nutrition’s scientists has contributed to a body of evidence showing parents may have to offer the same vegetable up to 10 times before their baby will accept it.

Flavour in baby food isn’t everything, however: texture is important, too. At the beginning of the weaning process, babies are often spoon fed with a soft purée.

As the months progress, they will be exposed to increasingly complex textures to encourage: biting, chewing and being able to clear the spoon with their lips. During the renovation process of Cow & Gate foods, Danone Early Life Nutrition’s team of nutritionists, dietitians and scientific experts with special interest in food behaviour looked into eating habits throughout the entire weaning period and beyond, and discovered that nutrition and a varied diet can have a positive impact on all the family.

Setting a good eating example Yet for positive eating behaviour to be passed on successfully, research stresses that parents need to set a good example with food. Role-modelling research demonstrates that babies and children learn about nutrition and eating habits from their parents; so if a child refuses to eat a particular food but then sees their parents eating and enjoying it, they may be more likely to want to try it themselves.

By following this advice, it should be possible to get baby into the habit of eating as varied a diet as possible— in what is arguably one of the most important periods of their lives.

Learn more from Danone on children’s taste preferences online, at globalcause.co.uk

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Dr Liz Goodwin Senior Fellow and Director, Food Loss and Waste, the World Resources Institute

F

Food waste is everybody’s opportunity

ood waste has bigger implications than many of us realise; economically, environmentally and for the millions of people who go to bed hungry each night.

If food loss and waste were its own country, it would be the third largest greenhouse gas emitter, according to data produced by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Not only does lost or wasted food negatively impact our climate, it’s also draining $940 billion from the economy, leaving millions to go hungry and placing huge pressure on limited natural resources.

Currently, around a third of all the food produced for human consumption goes uneaten. As Dr. Liz Goodwin, Senior Fellow and Director, Food Loss and Waste at the World Resources Institute, explains, “it’s going to be a combination of things that get us to 50 per cent less waste.”

Combined effort Since the start of the Sustainable Development Goals, which include the call to halve food loss and waste, the world has made progress. Today, 28 per cent of the global population live in a country or region with a target to reduce food loss and waste, and 60 per cent of the largest food companies have also set reduction targets. Is it enough though?

“Reducing food loss and waste is an enormous opportunity. But the action does not yet meet the scale of the challenge. Many more must set reduction targets, measure their food loss and waste, and enact innovative policies and programmes,” says Dr Goodwin. “To be successful, we need the overall approach of ‘target, measure, act’ to be adopted by countries and companies, including the whole supply chain from the point at which food is ready to harvest through to the end consumer. Everyone has a role to play.”

Country Greece City Idomeni Scenario On 05 December 2015, a mother and her baby wait to cross the Greek-Macedonian border at the makeshift camp of Idomeni, north of Greece.

ONLINE Thousands of refugees pass through the border every day near the small Greek town of Idomeni, crossing a barbed wire fence 3km long.

Families, mostly from Syria, went through it to continue their journey to Northern Europe, until the Balkan countries closed their borders, preventing them from continuing their journey.

For months thousands people camped near the border waiting to pass, hoping that the gates would open again.

At the end of May, Greek authorities closed the camp and deported many of them to official camps. globalcause.co.uk

PHOTO: ©FAO/GIUSEPPE CAROTENUTO

If not us, then who?

Millions go hungry while mountains of food are wasted every single day.

This World Food Day, we need to unite if we are to address this absurd paradox once and for all.

I

was born in circumstances where food waste would have been an inconceivable concept. I saw the daylight in 1951 in Kyusyur in Siberia, where my family was deported to in 1941 from Soviet-occupied Lithuania.

My childhood memories are of the impoverished and rough environments that I was living in as a young boy. These have stayed with me all my life, hence I can only perceive food waste as an absurdity. But the reality is that today we live in times

Vytenis Andriukaitis EU Commissioner for Health and Food Safety

where the world wastes roughly one-third of the food produced for human consumption. This costs the global economy almost £700 billion every year. It takes up more land than the whole of China and it accounts for eight per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Meanwhile, millions of people are forced to abandon their homes to escape hunger, poverty or even more immediate life-threatening situations.

How did we get here?

World Food Day, tomorrow, is not only time to celebrate the value and

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20 July 2017, San Lorenzo, Chiapas, Mexico

diversity of food but is also a moment to reflect on the unethical, immoral and all-too costly practice of ‘food waste’, which results in the avoidable and heavy burden on our planet. It is time for the world to take responsibility for a change that can only happen on a global scale.

Food losses and food waste occur at every stage of the food supply chain, from farm to fork. And every country, every organisation, every person has a role to play in cutting down waste and doing their bit in

“Every country, every organisation, every person has a role to play to cut down on waste.”

the fight against hunger and poverty.

This will require a complete change in the way we produce, market, distribute and consume food. We must design new, sustainable food systems that cut out waste at every step. It is not just a matter of necessity in the fight against poverty, climate change and unequal access to food. Rather, if we seize this opportunity, it will be a significant boost to our economy, with the creation of new jobs and services along the way.

As European Commissioner for

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PHOTO: ©Alex Webb/Magnum Photos for FAO

Health and Food Safety, I am fully committed to supporting the United Nations target of halving food waste by 2030. This can only happen if all players are willing to take concrete action, step up their co-operation and join efforts all along the food chain. A new EU Platform on Food Losses and Food Waste is part of our pledge to bring all sides – public and private – together and help us reach our Sustainable Development Goals as quickly as possible.

When it comes to the fight

against food waste it is a case of: if not us, then who? If not now, then when? We cannot afford to take our time when millions of people around the world still do not know where their next meal is coming from.

As you read these pages over breakfast, lunch or dinner, I encourage you to think about your meal and think about it mindfully.

We must all act now to change the way we eat, work and live. The stakes could not be any higher.

Let’s change the future of migration

©FAO/Giuseppe Carotenuto

Country: Italy City: Pozzallo Scenario: 01 July 2014, Pozzallo, Sicily. Migrants from Africa and the Middle East disembarked in the port of Pozzallo from an Italian navy boat after they were rescued in the Mediterranean Sea. There has been a significant increase in the number of migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to Italy. Most are from Africa or the Middle East and pay large sums to people smugglers in Libya who transport them in unsafe fishing vessels. The rise in numbers is because of Libya’s continuing political instability. The cause of many of the migrant tragedies in recent months has been the poor quality of the overcrowded boats making the crossings to Italy, largely from Libya and Tunisia.

The Director-General of the FAO will be joined by Pope Francis and Ministers of Agriculture attending the Group of Seven (G7) meetings for the official ceremony on 16 October 2017 at FAO Headquarters. Whereas traditionally a message from His Holiness is delivered during the WFD ceremony, for the first time, the Pope will attend in person and call on the international community to change the future of migration.

SOURCE: FAO WWW.FAO.ORG/WORLD-FOOD-DAY/2017/WFD-CEREMONY/EN/