Download or read book Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in an Era of Oil Scarcity written by Julia Wright and published by Earthscan. This book was released on 2012 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When other nations are forced to rethink their agricultural and food security strategies in light of the post-peak oil debate, they only have one living example to draw from: that of Cuba in the 1990s. Based on the first and - up till now - only systematic and empirical study to come out of Cuba on this topic, this book examines how the nation successfully headed off its own food crisis after the dissolution of the Soviet Bloc in the early 1990s. The author identifies the policies and practices required for such an achievement under conditions of petroleum-scarcity and in doing so, challenges the mainstream globalized and privatized food systems and food security strategies being driven through in both industrialized and more vulnerable developing regions. Paradoxically, the book dispels the myth that Cuba turned to organic farming nationwide, a myth founded on the success of Cuba's urban organic production systems which visitors to the country are most commonly exposed to. In rural regions, where the author had unique access, industrialized high-input and integrated agriculture is aspired to for the majority of domestic production, despite the ongoing fluctuations in availability of agrochemicals and fuel. By identifying the challenges faced by Cuban institutions and individuals in de-industrializing their food and farming systems, this book provides crucial learning material for the current fledgling attempts at developing energy descent plans and at mainstreaming more organic food systems in industrialized nations. It also informs international policy on sustainable agriculture and food security for less-industrialized countries.
Download or read book The Scarcity Slot written by Amanda L. Logan and published by University of California Press. This book was released on 2020-12-08 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. The Scarcity Slot is the first book to critically examine food security in Africa’s deep past. Amanda L. Logan argues that African foodways have been viewed through the lens of ‘the scarcity slot,’ a kind of Othering based on presumed differences in resources. Weaving together archaeological, historical, and environmental data with food ethnography, she advances a new approach to building long-term histories of food security on the continent in order to combat these stereotypes. Focusing on a case study in Banda, Ghana that spans the past six centuries, The Scarcity Slot reveals that people thrived during a severe, centuries-long drought just as Europeans arrived on the coast, with a major decline in food security emerging only recently. This narrative radically challenges how we think about African foodways in the past with major implications for the future.
Download or read book Food Insecurity and Hunger in the United States written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2006-05-02 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States is viewed by the world as a country with plenty of food, yet not all households in America are food secure, meaning access at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life. A proportion of the population experiences food insecurity at some time in a given year because of food deprivation and lack of access to food due to economic resource constraints. Still, food insecurity in the United States is not of the same intensity as in some developing countries. Since 1995 the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has annually published statistics on the extent of food insecurity and food insecurity with hunger in U.S. households. These estimates are based on a survey measure developed by the U.S. Food Security Measurement Project, an ongoing collaboration among federal agencies, academic researchers, and private organizations. USDA requested the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies to convene a panel of experts to undertake a two-year study in two phases to review at this 10-year mark the concepts and methodology for measuring food insecurity and hunger and the uses of the measure. In Phase 2 of the study the panel was to consider in more depth the issues raised in Phase 1 relating to the concepts and methods used to measure food security and make recommendations as appropriate. The Committee on National Statistics appointed a panel of 10 experts to examine the above issues. In order to provide timely guidance to USDA, the panel issued an interim Phase 1 report, Measuring Food Insecurity and Hunger: Phase 1 Report. That report presented the panel's preliminary assessments of the food security concepts and definitions; the appropriateness of identifying hunger as a severe range of food insecurity in such a survey-based measurement method; questions for measuring these concepts; and the appropriateness of a household survey for regularly monitoring food security in the U.S. population. It provided interim guidance for the continued production of the food security estimates. This final report primarily focuses on the Phase 2 charge. The major findings and conclusions based on the panel's review and deliberations are summarized.
Download or read book Water Scarcity Livelihoods and Food Security written by Larry W. Harrington and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-08-21 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume reviews the evolution of ten years’ learning and discovery about water scarcity, livelihoods, and food security within the CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food. It draws on the experiences of over 100 projects conducted in ten river basins in the developing world. The book describes how the program’s design evolved from an emphasis on water scarcity, water productivity, and water access to an emphasis on using water innovations to improve livelihoods and address development challenges in specific river basins. It shows how the research was used to foster change in stakeholder behavior, linking it to improved knowledge, attitudes, and skills, which were fostered by stakeholder participation, innovation, dialogue, and negotiation. The authors describe development challenges, their drivers and their political context, how to address them through technical, institutional, and policy innovations; and the consequences of change at different scales, time frames on equity, resilience, and ecosystem services. Overall, the work represents a major synthesis and landmark publication for all concerned with water resource management and sustainable development.
Download or read book Emerging Technologies for Promoting Food Security written by Chandra Madramootoo and published by Woodhead Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-13 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Emerging Technologies for Promoting Food Security: Overcoming the World Food Crisis discusses rising energy prices, increased biofuel use, water scarcity, and the rising world population, all factors that directly affect worldwide food security. The book examines the range of approaches to promoting global food security, including novel and existing agricultural and husbandry techniques for safe and sustainable food production. It is divided into three parts beginning with an overview of food security, an analysis of key drivers of food insecurity, and nutrition and food security. Part Two examines emerging technologies for plant and animal food security, with subsequent chapters discussing topics from genetic and aquaculture technologies, pest and disease control, environmental and policy issues affecting food security, and an in-depth analysis of water management and methods to reduce post-harvest losses. Provides a comprehensive overview of food security Thoroughly discusses rising energy prices, increased biofuel use, water scarcity, and the rising world population, all factors that directly affect worldwide food security Covers the emerging technologies for plant and animal food security Analyzes the policy issues affecting food security
Download or read book Coping with Water Scarcity written by Jean-Marc Faurès and published by Food & Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO). This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The report aims to provide a conceptual framework to address food security under conditions of water scarcity in agriculture. It has been prepared by a team of FAO staff and consultants in the framework of the project "Coping with water scarcity - the role of agriculture", and has been discussed at an Expert Consultation meeting organized in FAO, Rome, during the period 14-16 December 2009 on the same subject. It was subsequently edited and revised, taking account of discussions in the Expert Consultation and materials presented to the meeting. The purpose of the Expert Consultation was to assist FAO to better design its water scarcity programme. In particular, the experts were requested to provide recommendations on the range of technical and policy options and associated principles that FAO should promote as part of an agricultural response to water scarcity in member countries. The document offers views on the conceptual framework on which FAO's water scarcity programme should be based, proposes a set of definitions associated with the concept of water scarcity, and indicates the main principles on which FAO should base its action in support to its member countries. At the meeting, experts were requested to review the draft document and provide feedback and recommendations for its finalization. Issues that were addressed in discussions included: 3⁄4 Water scarcity: agreement on key definitions. 3⁄4 The conceptualisation of water scarcity in ways that are meaningful for policy development and decision-making. 3⁄4 The quantification of water scarcity. . 3⁄4 Policy and technical response options available to ensure food security in conditions of water scarcity. . 3⁄4 Criteria and principles that should be used to establish priorities for action in response to water scarcity in agriculture and ensure effective and efficient water scarcity coping strategies.
Download or read book Food Security and Scarcity written by C. Peter Timmer and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In countries that have managed to confront and cope with the challenges of food insecurity over the past two centuries, markets have done the heavy lifting. Markets serve as the arena for allocating society's scarce resources to meet the virtually unlimited needs and desires of consumers: no other mechanism can efficiently signal fluctuations in scarcity and abundance, the cost of labor, or the value of commodities. But markets fail at tasks that society regards as important; thus, governments have had to intervene to stabilize the economic environment and provide essential public goods, such as transportation and communications networks, agricultural research and development, and access to quality health and educational facilities. Ending hunger requires that each society find the right balance of market forces and government interventions to drive a process of economic growth that reaches the poor and ensures that food supplies are readily, and reliably, available and accessible to even the poorest households. But locating that balance has been a major challenge for many countries, and seems to be getting more difficult as the global economy becomes more integrated and less stable. Food Security and Scarcity explains what forms those challenges take in the long run and short term and at global, national, and household levels. C. Peter Timmer, best known for his work on the definitive text Food Policy Analysis, draws on decades of food security research and analysis to produce the most comprehensive and up-to-date assessment of what makes a productive, sustainable, and stable food system—and why so many countries have fallen short. Poverty and hunger are different in every country, so the manner of coping with the challenges of ending hunger and keeping it at bay will depend on equally country-specific analysis, governance, and solutions. Timmer shows that for all their problems and failures, markets and food prices are ultimately central to solving the problem of hunger, and that any coherent strategy to improve food security will depend on an in-depth understanding of how food markets operate. Published in association with the Center for Global Development.
Download or read book Food security in a world of natural resource scarcity written by Rosegrant, Mark W. and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2014-02-12 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The worlds population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050. Climate change, population, and income growth will drive food demand in the coming decades. Baseline scenarios show food prices for maize, rice, and wheat would significantly increase between 2005 and 2050, and the number of people at risk of hunger in the developing world would grow from 881 million in 2005 to more than a billion people by 2050. Food Security in a World of Natural Resource Scarcity: The Role of Agricultural Technologies examines which current and potential strategies offer solutions to fight hunger. The type and effectiveness of agricultural technologies are highly debated, and the debates are often polarized. Technology options are many, but transparent evidence-based information has been inconclusive or scarce. This book endeavors to respond to the challenge of growing food sustainably without degrading our natural resource base. The authors use a groundbreaking modeling approach that combines comprehensive process-based modeling of agricultural technologies with sophisticated global food demand, supply, and trade modeling. This approach assesses the yield and food impact through 2050 of a broad range of agricultural technologies under varying assumptions of climate change for the three key staple crops: maize, rice, and wheat. Geared toward policymakers in ministries of agriculture and national agricultural research institutes, as well as multilateral development banks and the private sector, Food Security in a World of Natural Resource Scarcity provides guidance on various technology strategies and which to pursue as competition grows for land, water, and energy across productive sectors and even increasingly across borders. The book is an important tool for targeting investment decisions today and going forward.
Download or read book Food Scarcity and Hunger written by Myra Faye Turner and published by Capstone. This book was released on 2022 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Every year, the world's farmers produce a lot of food for people to eat. Yet every night, millions of people around the world go to bed hungry. Why are people going without food when the earth is able to produce so much? In this nonfiction graphic novel, Max Axiom and the Society of Super Scientists go on a fact-finding mission to discover the reasons behind food scarcity. Young readers can join the team to find out why many people deal with food insecurity and learn ways that they can help"--
Download or read book Tough Choices written by Lester Russell Brown and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1996 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this, the seventh volume in the Worldwatch Environmental Alert series, Lester Brown observes that prices were climbing because world carryover stocks of grain had fallen to 48 days of consumption, the lowest level on record. Production was falling behind demand.
Download or read book The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2020 written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2020-07-01 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Updates for many countries have made it possible to estimate hunger in the world with greater accuracy this year. In particular, newly accessible data enabled the revision of the entire series of undernourishment estimates for China back to 2000, resulting in a substantial downward shift of the series of the number of undernourished in the world. Nevertheless, the revision confirms the trend reported in past editions: the number of people affected by hunger globally has been slowly on the rise since 2014. The report also shows that the burden of malnutrition in all its forms continues to be a challenge. There has been some progress for child stunting, low birthweight and exclusive breastfeeding, but at a pace that is still too slow. Childhood overweight is not improving and adult obesity is on the rise in all regions. The report complements the usual assessment of food security and nutrition with projections of what the world may look like in 2030, if trends of the last decade continue. Projections show that the world is not on track to achieve Zero Hunger by 2030 and, despite some progress, most indicators are also not on track to meet global nutrition targets. The food security and nutritional status of the most vulnerable population groups is likely to deteriorate further due to the health and socio economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The report puts a spotlight on diet quality as a critical link between food security and nutrition. Meeting SDG 2 targets will only be possible if people have enough food to eat and if what they are eating is nutritious and affordable. The report also introduces new analysis of the cost and affordability of healthy diets around the world, by region and in different development contexts. It presents valuations of the health and climate-change costs associated with current food consumption patterns, as well as the potential cost savings if food consumption patterns were to shift towards healthy diets that include sustainability considerations. The report then concludes with a discussion of the policies and strategies to transform food systems to ensure affordable healthy diets, as part of the required efforts to end both hunger and all forms of malnutrition.
Download or read book Food Security and Sociopolitical Stability written by Christopher B. Barrett and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-09-26 with total page 510 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Global food price spikes in 2008 and again in 2011 coincided with a surge of political unrest in low- and middle-income countries. Angry consumers took to the streets in scores of nations. In some places, food riots turned violent, pressuring governments and in a few cases contributed to their overthrow. Foreign investors sparked a new global land rush, adding a different set of pressures. With scientists cautioning that the world has entered a new era of steadily rising food prices, perhaps aggravated by climate change, the specter of widespread food insecurity and sociopolitical instability weighs on policymakers worldwide. In the past few years, governments and philanthropic foundations began redoubling efforts to resuscitate agricultural research and technology transfer, as well as to accelerate the modernization of food value chains to deliver high quality food inexpensively, faster, and in greater volumes to urban consumers. But will these efforts suffice? This volume explores the complex relationship between food security and sociopolitical stability up to roughly 2025. Organized around a series of original essays by leading global technical experts, a key message of this volume is that actions taken in an effort to address food security stressors may have consequences for food security, stability, or both that ultimately matter far more than the direct impacts of biophysical drivers such as climate or land or water scarcity. The means by which governments, firms, and private philanthropies tackle the food security challenge of the coming decade will fundamentally shape the relationship between food security and sociopolitical stability.
Download or read book The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2018 written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2018-09-14 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New evidence this year corroborates the rise in world hunger observed in this report last year, sending a warning that more action is needed if we aspire to end world hunger and malnutrition in all its forms by 2030. Updated estimates show the number of people who suffer from hunger has been growing over the past three years, returning to prevailing levels from almost a decade ago. Although progress continues to be made in reducing child stunting, over 22 percent of children under five years of age are still affected. Other forms of malnutrition are also growing: adult obesity continues to increase in countries irrespective of their income levels, and many countries are coping with multiple forms of malnutrition at the same time – overweight and obesity, as well as anaemia in women, and child stunting and wasting.
Download or read book Food Security and Scarcity written by C. Peter Timmer and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2015-01-06 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In countries that have managed to confront and cope with the challenges of food insecurity over the past two centuries, markets have done the heavy lifting. Markets serve as the arena for allocating society's scarce resources to meet the virtually unlimited needs and desires of consumers: no other mechanism can efficiently signal fluctuations in scarcity and abundance, the cost of labor, or the value of commodities. But markets fail at tasks that society regards as important; thus, governments have had to intervene to stabilize the economic environment and provide essential public goods, such as transportation and communications networks, agricultural research and development, and access to quality health and educational facilities. Ending hunger requires that each society find the right balance of market forces and government interventions to drive a process of economic growth that reaches the poor and ensures that food supplies are readily, and reliably, available and accessible to even the poorest households. But locating that balance has been a major challenge for many countries, and seems to be getting more difficult as the global economy becomes more integrated and less stable. Food Security and Scarcity explains what forms those challenges take in the long run and short term and at global, national, and household levels. C. Peter Timmer, best known for his work on the definitive text Food Policy Analysis, draws on decades of food security research and analysis to produce the most comprehensive and up-to-date assessment of what makes a productive, sustainable, and stable food system—and why so many countries have fallen short. Poverty and hunger are different in every country, so the manner of coping with the challenges of ending hunger and keeping it at bay will depend on equally country-specific analysis, governance, and solutions. Timmer shows that for all their problems and failures, markets and food prices are ultimately central to solving the problem of hunger, and that any coherent strategy to improve food security will depend on an in-depth understanding of how food markets operate. Published in association with the Center for Global Development.
Download or read book Food Insecurity written by Tamar Mayer and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-07-23 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the experiences, causes, and consequences of food insecurity in different geographical regions and historical eras. It highlights collective and political actions aimed at food sovereignty as solutions to mitigate suffering. Despite global efforts to end hunger, it persists and has even increased in some regions. This book provides interdisciplinary and historical perspectives on the manifestations of food insecurity, with case studies illustrating how people coped with violations of their rights during the war-time deprivation in France; the neoliberal incursions on food supply in Turkey, Greece, and Nicaragua; as well as the consequences of radioactive contamination of farmland in Japan. This edited collection adopts an analytical approach to understanding food insecurity by examining how the historical and political situations in different countries have resulted in an unfolding dialectic of food insecurity and resistance, with the most marginalized people—immigrants, those in refugee camps, poor peasants, and so forth—consistently suffering the worst effects, yet still maintaining agency to fight back. The book tackles food insecurity on a local as well as a global scale and will thus be useful for a broad range of audiences, including students, scholars, and the general public interested in studying food crises, globalization, and current global issues.
Download or read book Full Planet Empty Plates The New Geopolitics of Food Scarcity written by Lester R. Brown and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2012-09-11 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With food supplies tightening, countries are competing for the land and waterresources needed to feed their people.
Download or read book New Challenges to Food Security written by Ian Christoplos and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-11-13 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Food security is high on the political agenda. Fears about societal insecurity due to food price increases and hunger, grave scenarios regarding the effects of climate change and general uncertainty about the impacts of investments in biofuels and so-call “land grabbing” on food prices and availability have meant that food security is now recognised as being a multifaceted challenge. This book is unique in that it will bring together analyses of these different factors that impact on food security. This volume will describe a range of different perspectives on food security, with an emphasis on the various meanings that are applied to food security “crisis”. The challenges to be reviewed include market volatility, climate change and state fragility. Analyses of responses to food security crises and risk will cover rural and urban contexts, arenas of national policy formation and global food regimes, and investment in land and productive technologies. This book is unique in two respects. First, it takes a step back from the normative literature focused on specific factors of, for example, climate change, agricultural production or market volatility to look instead at the dynamic interplay between these new challenges. It helps readers to understand that food security is not one discourse, but is rather related to how these different factors generate multiple risks and opportunities. Second, through the case studies the book particularly emphasises how these factors come together at local levels as farmers, entrepreneurs, consumers, local government officials and others are making key decisions about what will be done to address food security and whose food security will be given priority. The book will explore how food production and consumption is embedded in powerful political and market forces and how these influence local actions.
