ZERO HUNGER THE END GOAL

Akila Wijerathna highlights options available to increase food production

Achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goal of Zero Hunger requires an increase in the productivity and incomes of smallholder farmers. This will entail a transformation of food systems and require a systemic approach, multidisciplinary analysis, multi-stakeholder consultation and cross sectoral coordination.

To achieve zero hunger, more attention needs to be paid to production and consumption. It’s also essential to identify suitable species enabling environments across value chains to promote sustainable production, processing, marketing and consumption.

Closing the gaps in production and nutrition requires a transformation of the current agriculture and food systems with a move to greater diversity. A holistic perspective can provide answers for tackling malnutrition, and addressing climate change and environmental threats in agricultural production.

Nutrition sensitive and climate smart agriculture interventions can tap local potential to promote agricultural productivity that meets nutritional requirements.

According to the FAO, about 75 percent of the world’s food comes from only five animal species and 12 plants. Almost half of our plant derived calories comes from only three types of food: wheat, corn and rice.

Germ plasm for these plants is bred for extended storage time and disease resistance, flavour, colour and nutritional value. The lack of biodiversity and nutrition in our global diet restricts the value of plant molecules in human health.

However, reliance on a few staple crops and limited product diversity are two major limiting factors in agriculture and food systems. Those crops relying on high input requirements leave farming more vulnerable to environmental shocks especially under climate change. And starchy crops can lead to unbalanced diets and malnutrition.

The food industry’s interest in microalgae, fungi, superfoods and underutilised crops is increasing due to new consumer habits and sustainability of production, as well as for health reasons.

Neglected and underutilised species can address malnutrition from a food system perspective while dietary and production diversity also need to improve.

Today, superfoods and cellular agriculture have emerged as increasingly significant food tech categories. Superfoods are marketed as health food products due to their extraordinary nutritional and medicinal values.

Cellular agriculture is an upcoming technology for producing meat and other livestock products from cell cultures. It is a nascent technology that allows meat and other agricultural products to be cultured from cells in a bioreactor rather than harvested from livestock.

It’s an essential and perhaps revolutionary technology that presents opportunities to improve animal welfare, improve human health and decrease the environmental footprint of meat production.

The price of meat products in the market doesn’t recover the full environmental costs involved in production such as greenhouse gas emissions and water use. With more people choosing to limit their consumption of animal-based food, the alternative protein market has grown considerably over the past couple of years.

And the largest share of this includes meat analogues made from legumes. Further, cellular agriculture food also addresses other pressing issues such as climate change.

AI and machine learning together with IoT can be used to gain the most traction in farming. While these can’t replace human labour and human cognitive functions however, they can enhance traditional jobs and allow for greater efficiency.

Controlled environment agriculture (CEA) – including green­house and indoor production – is a small but high-potential part of this future food system. CEA comes in many forms with each offering a unique element to improve supply chain resiliency, quality and safety, and fill gaps in supply in the product category.

It’s a growing part of our evolving food system and can work alongside outdoor produc­tion to mitigate climate risk, and help solve systemic nutrition and food access challenges.

Indoor agriculture offers new growth formats, methods and technologies to increase product quality, consistency and diversity. For example, advancements in CEA tailored seeds bred for traits such as flavour, colour, nutrient density and ripening will expose consumers to more varied products.

Ultimately, indoor agriculture will help grow speciality ingredients, spices and superfoods; and eventually, inputs for food as medicine. Notably, indoor farming is expected to dramatically increase annual cropping, reduce water use and improve energy efficiency.

Major transformations in agricultural systems, rural economies and natural resource management are needed to reduce the risk of food insecurity, and ensure a healthy future for the planet and its people. Furthermore, our food choices will impact local and national economies, as well as the environment.