The Global Food Supply Is In Trouble
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I've been meaning to discuss the fragilities of the global food supply, and this article offers a good entry point: Food as You Know It Is About to Change.
Here are some excerpts:
"The world as a whole is already facing what the Cornell agricultural economist Chris Barrett calls a 'food polycrisis.' Over the past decade, he says, what had long been reliable global patterns of year-on-year improvements in hunger first stalled and then reversed. Rates of undernourishment have grown 21 percent since 2017.
Obesity has continued to rise, and the average micronutrient content of dozens of popular vegetables has continued to fall. The food system is contributing to the growing burden of diabetes and heart disease and to new spillovers of infectious diseases from animals to humans as well.
Worldwide, wholesale food prices, adjusted for inflation, have grown about 50 percent since 1999, and those prices have also grown considerably more volatile, making not just markets but the whole agricultural Rube Goldberg network less reliable. Overall, American grocery prices have grown by almost 21 percent since 2021.
More than one-third of the planet's land is used to produce food, and 70 percent of all fresh water is used to irrigate farmland."
We've found that abundance does not equate to health, as the global food system has been designed to deliver calories rather than nutrition. The decline in nutritive value has led to "hidden hunger," as our food is calorie-rich but nutrient-poor: we're full but starved of essential nutrients, so we keep eating more in a vain attempt to get what we need to be healthy.
This BBC article explains why food has lost so much of its nutritive content: The Green Revolution that boosted yields (calories) but at the expense of protein and micro-nutrients. How modern food can regain its nutrients.
Here are some excerpts:
"The nutritional values of some popular vegetables, from asparagus to spinach, have dropped significantly since 1950. A 2004 US study found important nutrients in some garden crops are up to 38% lower than there were at the middle of the 20th Century.
While the Green Revolution helped to tackle world hunger, today we find ourselves with a global food system that in some cases has been designed to deliver calories and cosmetic perfection but not necessarily nutrition. This is contributing to a phenomenon called hidden hunger, where people feel sated but may not be healthy, as their food is calorie-rich but nutrient-poor. It might initially sound counter-intuitive but obese individuals can be nutrient-deficient.
What we would need is a food production system which monitors nutrition in food and makes it universally comparable, and a commercial model that values nutrition above everything else, concludes McGrath. How that could be achieved remains to be seen.
"Farmers need to be paid for effective nutrient yield, not just mass of produce. Right now, the model of being paid per ton of grain doesn't stack up from a human health perspective," says McGrath.
There are many moving parts in the links between nutrition and farming, and much that is not yet fully understood. Simply put, more research is needed, but with more than two billion people globally affected by micronutrient deficiencies, so much good could come from following the trail of nutrients."
This article adds additional context to the decline in nutritive content: Sick to Death: Unhealthy Food and Failed Technologies -- the decline of nutrients in food since the Green Revolution.
"The world is experiencing a micronutrient food and health crisis. Micronutrient deficiency now affects billions of people. Micronutrients are key vitamins and minerals and deficiencies can cause severe health conditions. They are important for various functions, including blood clotting, brain development, the immune system, energy production and bone health, and play a critical role in disease prevention.
The root of the crisis is due to an increased reliance on ultra processed foods and the way that modern food crops are grown in terms of the seeds used, the plants produced, the synthetic inputs required (fertilizers, pesticides etc) and the effects on soil.
The Broadbalk Wheat Experiment, began in 1843, show significant decreasing trends in the concentrations of zinc, copper, iron and magnesium in wheat grain since the 1960s. The researchers say that the concentrations of these four minerals remained stable between 1845 and the mid 1960s but have since decreased significantly by 20-30%. This coincided with the introduction of Green Revolution semi-dwarf, high-yielding cultivars.
The paper "New Histories of the Green Revolution" (2019) by Prof. Glenn Stone debunks the claim that the Green Revolution boosted productivity: it merely put more (nutrient-deficient) wheat into the Indian diet at the expense of other food crops. Stone argues that food productivity per capita showed no increased or even actually decreased."
The double-whammy of food's declining nutritive value and the rise of Ultra-processed foods (UPFs) has generated a global health crisis. This is exacerbated by poor informational / disclosure policies influenced by corporate lobbying to protect profits: The US food industry has long buried the truth about their products. Is that coming to an end?
"Ultra-processed foods (UPFs) are industrially formulated products made out of substances extracted from foods, like sugars, salts, hydrogenated fats, bulking agents and starches (think sugary breakfast cereals, microwave dinners, soft drinks and packaged snacks). Today, UPFs make up 73% of the US food supply, according to Northeastern University’s Network Science Institute, and provide the average US adult with more than 60% of their daily calories. But research is increasingly linking UPFs to a whole host of health issues: from cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes to colorectal cancer and depression."
High levels of ultra-processed foods linked with early death, brain issues.
Cancer rates in millennials, Gen X-ers have risen starkly in recent years, study finds. Experts have 1 prime suspect: obesity linked to Ultra-processed foods (UPFs)
Ultra-Processed Foods Linked To Increased Risks For 32 Health Conditions.
The "cure" for obesity promoted by the pharmaceutical industry--weight-loss medications--come with many downsides, and since they don't address nutritional deficiencies, those losing weight via medications are not necessarily healthy:
What Happens When Ozempic Takes Over Your Town.
The concentration of food production, processing and distribution in a few companies is a systemic source of fragility. Do We Really Want a Food Cartel?
"Mergers and acquisitions have created food oligopolies that are inefficient, barely regulated, unfair, and even dangerous.
A handful of companies now control the food system of the United States, stifling competition in ways not seen since the great trusts and monopolies of the late 1890s. The mergers and acquisitions of the past four decades have greatly reduced the number of companies—a fact hidden by the multiplicity of brands."
The production of food is also increasingly concentrated in the nation's mega-farms, as small farms cannot compete financially: 80% of the value of agricultural products is generated by farms with annual revenues of $1 million or higher. Over 140,000 Farms Lost in 5 Years (American Farm Bureau Federation)
"Between 2017 and 2022, the number of farms in the U.S. declined by 141,733 or 7%, according to USDA’s 2022 Census of Agriculture, released on Feb. 13. Acres operated by farm operations during the same timeframe declined by 20.1 million (2.2%), a loss equivalent to an area about the size of Maine.
Even minor declines in farmed area can have a significant impact on the rural identity of states with smaller acreage and higher rates of commercial and residential development. The more land shifted out of agriculture production, the harder it is to return those acres to farming.
In New England, on a weight basis, farmers produce only about 21% as much food as the states consume.
Between 2017 and 2022 the number of farms in the $0 - $4,999 economic class dropped the most, by 120,970 (13%), followed by the $5,000 - $49,000 category, which lost 32,215 operations (5%). The category of farms in an economic class over a million grew by 28,566 operations (36%). The number of farms in lower economic classes shrunk at a faster rate than those in higher economic classes. That said, most ag production is generated by farms in higher economic classes. In 2017, 69% of the value of agricultural products sold was products by farms in the million-dollar-plus economic class. In 2022 this increased to 79%.
Farms that are able often expand in size to capitalize on economies of scale, a concept rooted in the efficiency often gained as production increases. Mechanization and modern technology, which often come with substantial upfront costs, are more economically justifiable for larger operations, further boosting productivity.
In 2022, family and individual filings, partnerships and family-held corporations represented 91% (801 million) of all acres operated in the U.S.
Though the data shows an ongoing consolidation of farms into fewer, larger operations, it also highlights the adaptability of farmers and ranchers. Despite fewer farms and reduced acreage, the value of agricultural production has increased by 40% (17% in inflation-adjusted dollars), reaching $543 billion in 2022."
Climate change is already having an impact, one that is expected to expand: Global Climate Change Impact on Crops Expected Within 10 Years, NASA Study Finds (via Cheryl A.)
What wasn't mentioned in these articles that matters more than what was discussed?
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