The food-biodiversity challenge: a sustainable food system Flashcards
(32 cards)
What are the three components of the “Great Balancing Act” for a sustainable food system?
- Closing the food gap (sufficient food - 60% increase in food calories by 2050 required)
- Supporting economic development (28% employed by agriculture)
- Reducing environmental impact (30% GHG emissions)
Describe modern intensive agricultural practices.
- Maximise yields relative to land use and costs
- Homogenous landscapes with low crop-diversity, and high use of fertilisers, agrochemicals, and irrigation
- Concentration of environmental impacts at local scale
- Current food system responsible for ~30% of greenhouse gas emissions (including CH4 from ruminants and N2O from fertilisers)
What are five examples of non-intensive farming forms?
Mixed farming: includes crops and livestock
Nomadic pastoralism: livestock herded for fresh pasture
Shifting cultivation:
Plots of land cultivated temporarily → abandoned → vegetation grows back
Organic farming: fertilisers of organic origin (e.g., manure)
Agroforestry: Trees grow in-between crops/pasture
What is subsistence farming?
A plot of land produces only enough food to feed those who work it—little or nothing produced for sale or trade
Where is subsistence farming typically found globally?
Developing countries (sub-Saharan Africa, northern South America).
Responsible for producing 70% of food in sub-Saharan Africa
Which SDG does subsistence farming help to meet?
Goal 2 - Zero hunger
Within this:
- Target 2.3 -> double productivity/incomes of small-scale food producers
- Target 2.6 -> invest in rural infrastructure, agricultural research, technology, gene banks
What are some future social and environmental changes that might affect subsistence farmers and their food security?
- Desertification/expansion of desert
- More frequent natural disasters
- Spread of pests and livestock diseases
- Increasing population/demand
What are four technological advances to support sustainable increases in food production?
- GPS
- Genetically Modified Crops (GMC)
- Precision farming
- Climate-smart agriculture
Explain the use of GPS as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
Uses geospatial information to manage resources over large areas - can link to precision farming (reduced resource waste)
Explain the use of GMCs as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
Increase yields and crop resilience
Explain the use of precision farming as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
Involves the application of resources (water, nutrients and pesticides) where and when needed rather than to the whole field.
This reduces waste and inputs/environmental impacts and can be:
- high tech = GPS, robotics, drones
- low tech = bottle caps to fertilise individual plants
Explain the goals of climate-smart agriculture as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
- Increase productivity and incomes
- Increase resilience of crops to climate change
- Decrease GHG emissions
Explain the components of climate-smart agriculture as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
- Increases input efficiency
- Decreases waste
- Increases carbon sequestration
- Applies context specific strategies
- Changes management practices
- Includes on-farm energy production
What are the critiques of climate-smart agriculture as a technological advance for sustainable increases in food production?
- No sustainability standards or certification
- Fails to address inequalities in production and distribution
List some farming techniques that can be used to sustainably increase farming (that aren’t tech related as such, just good practices).
- Crop rotation
- Hydroponics/aquaponics (no soil used - instead growth occurs in water)
- Vertical farming
What are three features required for a sustainable food system?
- Increased supply
- Improved efficiency
- Reduced environmental impacts
What needs to be considered when attempting to increase the sustainability of food production?
- Constraints and trade offs (e.g., biodiversity vs food production)
- Economic, social and environmental issues
What is sustainable intensification?
The increase in yields without adverse environmental impact and without the cultivation of more land.
What are the three principles of sustainable intensification?
- A frozen agricultural land footprint (no further expansion of agricultural land)
- Reduced environmental impacts
- Increased yields (where possible)
Does Sustainable Intensification prescribe specific farming techniques?
No. SI is a policy goal, not a fixed method. It may include a range of practices like biotechnology, precision agriculture, agroecology, organic farming, etc., depending on local context.
Why may sustainable intensification be controversial in terms of producing a sustainable food system?
Food insecurity can be failure of socio-economic access to food, rather than insufficient supply - needs to incorporate distribution, demand and waste.
How are the techniques and methods involved in sustainable intensification selected?
- Use only evidence based techniques
- Select based on the context and location
Is sustainable intensification capable of being transformative?
29% of worldwide farms now practice forms of SI, suggesting that a tipping point may be reached where it becomes transformative.
What does regenerative farming do?
Uses soil conservation to:
- Regenerate and deliver ecosystem services
- Enhance the environmental, social and economic aspects of food production
