The Future of Food and Farming: One year on
Channel: The Government Office for Science
Date: 2012-05-23

Foresight spoke to the chair of project lead expert group and stakeholders about the report The Future of Food and Farming, published in January 2011, and how it has impacted their work. UK Government's Defra and DFID, British Chamber of Commerce, OXFAM all contributed. Government Chief Scientific Adviser Sir John Beddington, head of the lead expert group Professor Charles Godfray, Phil Bloomer from OXFAM, Stephen O'Brien MP from DFID, Jim Paice MP from Defra, Paul Leonard from British Chamber of Commerce all give their responses.

The Foresight project Global Food and Farming Futures explores the increasing pressures on the global food system between now and 2050. The Report highlights the decisions that policy makers need to take today, and in the years ahead, to ensure that a global population rising to nine billion or more can be fed sustainably and equitably.

The Foresight report makes a compelling case for urgent action to redesign the global food system to meet the challenge of feeding the world over the next 40 years.

The Project analysed five key challenges for the future:

A. Balancing future demand and supply sustainably -- to ensure that food supplies are affordable.
B. Ensuring that there is adequate stability in food prices -- and protecting the most vulnerable from the volatility that does occur.
C. Achieving global access to food and ending hunger - this recognises that producing enough food in the world so that everyone can potentially be fed is not the same thing as ensuring food security for all.
D. Managing the contribution of the food system to the mitigation of climate change.
E. Maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem services while feeding the world.