Tagline: Is sustainable intensification a meaninful concept?
Champion: Aziz
Team:
The challenge to the near future is to meet the demand for food under the presence of growing global population, political instabilities, economic and social changes and limited resource availability. It is no longer possible to rely on agricultural expansion via acquiring new and productive lands with the purpose of feeding future population which is going to reach 9 billion by 2050. There is also threat posed by climate variations, natural disasters and floods that are having devastating impact on surplus generated by global economic growth. This questions sustainability of future production, ecosystem, environment and our surrounding nature. The next generation is food insecure and there is no clear evidence that poverty and hunger will be reduced under current shocks at all levels. Soon, we will be talking not about how to sustain but how to survive! .... and sustainable diversification is key for survival. Moving towards sustainable diversification requires not only producing sustainably and adapting to shocks but also changing peoples’ diets and wasting less food by developing education and training programs and also changing peoples’ habits and thinking. Sustainable diversification is more about exploration rather than exploitation.
Should we also consider sustainable diversification when we talk about sustainable intensification? It seems comprehensive research is required to investigate this topic from different angles.
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