Feeding the world

WITH COMPASSION

Throughout history, there have been concerns about food security - ensuring enough food to feed all. Having just begun to reduce the number of people who have too little to eat, we are now facing a new global food crisis.

Over one third of the world's cereal crops go to animal feed, not to feeding people

With oil prices rocketing, we are facing an energy crisis. 95% of food products are oil-dependent, and we rely on fertilisers and mechanisation to increase production. Are bio-fuels the answer? If land goes to bio-fuels, that’s less land for food. The OECD reckons that the USA, Canada and European Union would need to switch between 30% and 70% of their current crop areas to provide just 10% of their transport needs from bio-fuels. And already over a third of global cereals and over 90% soya goes to animal feed, not for direct food for humans. No wonder the prices of cereal staple foods are soaring.

Most of this increased cost of world food commodities is due to rising prices of imported coarse grains and vegetable oils – the commodity groups which feature most heavily in bio-fuel production. With prices forecast to rise in 2008, it will be difficult for rich country importers but dire for developing countries.

The scale of the population’s growth and its food requirements are unprecedented. World population is rising rapidly - from 6.6 billion in 2007, it will be 9.1 billion by 2050. By 2030, five billion will live in urban areas. But if urbanisation is inexorable, who will form the rural labour force? Currently, an estimated 50% of world’s workforce works in agriculture, many of them women and children. The Fair Trade movement is focused on their vulnerability.

What about land? Even the best reckoning believes we could at most use another 12% of land for agriculture. A recent UK study showed consumers actually use food as though they have six times more land and sea available to them than they do. And far from being efficient, the UK Government calculates that consumers throw away about a quarter of all food produced.

It takes 2,400 litres of water to produce one 150g hamburger

Undoubtedly lack of water may bring the looming crisis to a head. Globally, of all drinkable freshwater, households use 10%, industry 20% and agriculture 70%. Today 92% of humanity has a relative sufficiency of drinkable water but by 2025 this will be 62%. The notion of ‘embedded water’ is likely to be as important as greenhouse gas emissions.

To produce one kilo of grain-fed beef requires 15 cubic metres of water. One kilo of cereals needs 0.4-3 cubic metres. There is talk of labelling foods for their water. A 250ml glass of beer uses 75 litres of water; a glass of apple juice takes 190; a 150g hamburger takes 2,400.

Without knowing it, food trade transfers water across borders. The equivalent of 20 Nile Rivers already move annually from developing to developed countries.

The issue of climate change is undoubtedly the other “crunch” issue. The Stern report on Climate Change found agriculture responsible for 14% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2000. Of agriculture’s emissions, fertilisers were responsible for 38%. Livestock was the second greatest source of agriculture-related GHGs, accounting for 31%. A 2006 European Union life cycle assessment of consumer impacts found that food and drink sectors were the most significant source of GHGs, accounting for 20-30% of the various environmental impacts of the most common forms of European consumption. The most significant sectors were firstly meat and meat products and secondly dairy.

In health circles we refer to the change from traditional diets to the modern “western” diet as the nutrition transition. As people become more affluent, they change their diets, eating more sugars, soft drinks, meat and dairy. This in turn is associated with a change in disease patterns. There is a rise in diet-related ill-health from chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity. If we eat a high-meat diet, its impact is far greater than if we eat a plant-based diet. The FAO has calculated that livestock generates 18% of total greenhouse gas emissions (CO2 equivalent), which is more than transport. Should humans stop treating the planet as a limitless resource? Definitely yes.

Water scarcity, climate change and disease - just three other impacts of rampant intensive farming

But can we develop a way of consuming which treads lighter on the earth? Politicians and business leaders are locked into electoral and consuming cycles. Each bows to consumer sovereignty. There needs to be more interest in dietary change as a policy focus for government and business. As yet, rich consumers show no sign of being prepared to consume both less and differently. So business and politics pander to them.

If everyone eats meat and dairy like the US or Europe, the world continues walking into a crisis. We need pressure on consumers to change. The political question is not will they, but when will they - and will it take crisis to engender the change?

A recent study of the UK showed how the current six-planet living food profile becomes more sustainable if diet is radically altered. If we eat less, and farm differently, there is room for manoeuvre. Compassion in World Farming is right to call for a reduction in meat and dairy production and consumption. By combining your “Eat less” message with your message on providing high standards of farm animal welfare, you are helping to promote some of the solutions to the current crisis.

Professor Tim Lang

Professor Tim Lang

Tim Lang is Professor of Food Policy at City University, London and a leading global authority on the impact of food policy on society, on our health and on the environment. He is regularly consulted by international agencies such as the World Health Organisation.

In the late 1980s, Compassion in World Farming worked closely with him, when he was Director of the London Food Commission, on a successful campaign against the use of the genetically engineered dairy hormone, BST. Tim started out as a hill farmer and is deeply sympathetic to farm animal welfare issues.

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Buying free range or organic will encourage higher welfare farming which poses fewer risks to animals, people and the planet. Eating less meat and dairy reduces the environmental impact of animal farming and can improve human health.

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