The FAO’ Food Security Summit, recently held in Rome, gathered together the international community to discuss about the state of poverty around the world. In 1996 the Millennium Goal aimed to cut by half the number of hungry people by 2015, then estimated at 800 million; today the goal is not only far from the original prediction but other 50 million are suffering. We need more food, we have to increase the production and Europe is starting to look at GMO cultivations to face this global crisis.
A worrying alarm arrives now from the Italian Farmers Association (CIA): mass amounts of food is sitting and rotting in their fields because sale prices don’t cover all of the costs of production. The result is a 1.5 million of tons wasted every year and 4 billion of Euro frittered away. All this with rising costs for Italian consumers and farmers.
The organization Altroconsumo (AC) is fuelling a much needed debate on food supply in Italy. About the issue of food prices AC is claiming a supply chain with a reduction in the geographical distance between producers and consumers may provide a solution to many problems. Reduced prices, according to AC, are among the many benefits of a shortened production and distribution process. Fruit prices have increased by 5% in the last year alone. With the average household in Italy consuming approximately 200kg of fruit and vegetables every year, price rises of this order are not insignificant.From producer to retailer the cost of fruit and vegetables increase dramatically: from the moment of picking to when they are displayed at the local grocery store the price of apples increases by 45%, tomatoes by 46%.
Food waste is also harmful to the environment. The food we throw away needlessly is responsible for a huge amount of carbon dioxide emissions: it’s not just the methane that’s released when the food goes to landfill that’s the problem, but also the energy spent producing, storing and transporting the food to us. Food waste is an enormous challenge, especially because most of us don’t yet recognise the amount we all produce. But it is also a massive opportunity to reduce waste, save money and minimise our impact on the environment.
Altroconsumo claims that a shorter supply chain wouldn’t only keep costs down but also provide indirect benefits to consumers such as improvements in freshness and nutritional value. There are also potential benefits to the environment. Transporting 1kg of Argentinean cherries to Rome, for instance, involves a plane travelling 12,000 km and producing around 16kg of CO2 emissions.
In addition to this it’s estimated that 450 thousand tons of food go to waste every year in Italian supermarkets. Fortunately something is going to change locally: the Last Minute Market. This system was tested in a concrete initiative that allowed the transfer of perfectly eatable unsold food products (otherwise transported and destroyed elsewhere) from a food shop to a number of charity associations. The project was launched by Prof. Andrea Segré, chair of the agriculture department at Bologna’s University.
Starting in 2003, the organization has recovered (from cafeterias, supermarkets and farmers) high quality 140 tons providing each day a meal for 250 people and 500 dogs and cats in Bologna. By providing a cost-effective service for both profit (food shops) and non-profit (charity associations) organizations, the model resulted not only useful from a social point of view but also economically viable and environmentally sustainable. The experiment was expanded to another seven towns, including Ferrara, Modena, Verona and Florence, and a study to extend abroad the Last Minute Market will be soon developed in Argentina and Brazil.
A nice source: Love Food Hate Waste
Image courtesy of Teresa at Flickr under Creative Commons
Such an important subject, this should stir some debate – thanks.
On emissions, one of my favourite comparisons is with regards one tonne of strawberries: transporting them from Kent (UK) to Kent (UK) emits 0.017 tonnes of CO2. Transporting one tonne from Israel to Kent emits 4.606 tonnes of CO2.
But it’s more complicated than that I think. Farmers in the UK that I have spoken to are frustrated that they are increasingly expected to grow ‘organically’ – their yields are so low (disease among other things kills off much of their produce) that they can’t afford to keep growing (and much UK policy encourages this – farmers are expected to “diversify” i.e. transform their farms into tourist attractions). Many of them can’t wait for GM crops and I don’t blame them for that.
Another issue worth mentioning is of course agriculture (agro-industry), the common agricultural policy and all that. Subsidies have over the years created enormous and complicated problems, that policy makers tend to exacerbate by making even more crazy demands on their farmers (the recent biofuels stuff is a good example). “The Object of Development: America’s Egypt” by Tim Mitchell (NYU) is worth a read if you get the chance.