Enabling food system innovation: accelerators for change.

It is widely accepted that current food systems are not on a trajectory for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by the end of the decade. Technological innovation will have a considerable role to play in different parts of the food system; many promising options exist or are in the pipeline, some of which may be highly disruptive to existing value chains. Scaling up the innovations required, at the same time as protecting those who may lose out in the short term, will require a strong enabling environment.

Beyond the Food Systems Summit: Linking Recommendations to Action-The True Cost of Food.

A transformation of food systems is needed to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals specified in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Recognizing the true costs and benefits of food production and consumption can help guide public policy decisions to effectively transform food systems in support of sustainable healthy diets. A new, expanded framework is presented that allows the quantification of costs and benefits in three domains: health, environmental, and social.

The cost of diversity in livestock feed rations.

This study investigates the financial cost of increasing the diversity of cereal grains in livestock feed rations. We first develop a nonlinear mathematical programming model that determines the least-cost composition of livestock feed rations of one metric ton that have at least the same energy and nutrient content as a reference feed ration. We then add into the model a diversity constraint using the Simpson Index of diversity to examine how changes in the diversity of the commodities in the ration affect the cost of the ration while maintaining the ration's energy and nutrient content at a reference ration value.

Ethical and economic implications of the adoption of novel plant-based beef substitutes in the USA: a general equilibrium modelling study.

Background: Slowing climate change is crucial to the future wellbeing of human societies and the greater environment. Current beef production systems in the USA are a major source of negative environmental impacts and raise various animal welfare concerns. Nevertheless, beef production provides a food source high in protein and many nutrients as well as providing employment and income to millions of people.

Modelling the global economic consequences of a major African swine fever outbreak in China.

African swine fever is a deadly porcine disease that has spread into East Asia where it is having a detrimental effect on pork production. However, the implications of African swine fever on the global pork market are poorly explored. Two linked global economic models are used to explore the consequences of different scales of the epidemic on pork prices and on the prices of other food types and animal feeds.

Perspective article: Actions to reconfigure food systems.

There is broad agreement that current food systems are not on a sustainable trajectory that will enable us to reach the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, particularly in the face of anthropogenic climate change. Guided by a consideration of some food system reconfigurations in the past, we outline an agenda of work around four action areas: rerouting old systems into new trajectories; reducing risks; minimising the environmental footprint of food systems; and realigning the enablers of change needed to make new food systems function. Here we highlight food systems levers that, along with activities within these four action areas, may shift food systems towards more sustainable, inclusive, healthy and climate-resilient futures.

Gaps between fruit and vegetable production, demand, and recommended consumption at global and national levels: an integrated modelling study.

Background: Current diets are detrimental to both human and planetary health and shifting towards more balanced, predominantly plant-based diets is seen as crucial to improving both. Low fruit and vegetable consumption is itself a major nutritional problem. We aim to better quantify the gap between future fruit and vegetable supply and recommended consumption levels by exploring the interactions between supply and demand in more than 150 countries from 1961 to 2050.

Combining the effects of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide on protein, iron, and zinc availability and projected climate change on global diets: a modelling study.

Background: Increasing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO) affect global nutrition via effects on agricultural productivity and nutrient content of food crops. We combined these effects with economic projections to estimate net changes in nutrient availability between 2010 and 2050.

Methods: In this modelling study, we used the International Model for Policy Analysis of Agricultural Commodities and Trade to project per capita availability of protein, iron, and zinc in 2050.

Key determinants of global land-use projections.

Land use is at the core of various sustainable development goals. Long-term climate foresight studies have structured their recent analyses around five socio-economic pathways (SSPs), with consistent storylines of future macroeconomic and societal developments; however, model quantification of these scenarios shows substantial heterogeneity in land-use projections. Here we build on a recently developed sensitivity approach to identify how future land use depends on six distinct socio-economic drivers (population, wealth, consumption preferences, agricultural productivity, land-use regulation, and trade) and their interactions.

Agricultural investments and hunger in Africa modeling potential contributions to SDG2 - Zero Hunger.

We use IFPRI's IMPACT framework of linked biophysical and structural economic models to examine developments in global agricultural production systems, climate change, and food security. Building on related work on how increased investment in agricultural research, resource management, and infrastructure can address the challenges of meeting future food demand, we explore the costs and implications of these investments for reducing hunger in Africa by 2030. This analysis is coupled with a new investment estimation model, based on the perpetual inventory methodology (PIM), which allows for a better assessment of the costs of achieving projected agricultural improvements.

Health-motivated taxes on red and processed meat: A modelling study on optimal tax levels and associated health impacts.

Background: The consumption of red and processed meat has been associated with increased mortality from chronic diseases, and as a result, it has been classified by the World Health Organization as carcinogenic (processed meat) and probably carcinogenic (red meat) to humans. One policy response is to regulate red and processed meat consumption similar to other carcinogens and foods of public health concerns. Here we describe a market-based approach of taxing red and processed meat according to its health impacts.

Health and nutritional aspects of sustainable diet strategies and their association with environmental impacts: a global modelling analysis with country-level detail.

Background: Sustainable diets are intended to address the increasing health and environmental concerns related to food production and consumption. Although many candidates for sustainable diets have emerged, a consistent and joint environmental and health analysis of these diets has not been done at a regional level. Using an integrated health and environmental modelling framework for more than 150 countries, we examined three different approaches to sustainable diets motivated by environmental, food security, and public health objectives.

Options for keeping the food system within environmental limits.

The food system is a major driver of climate change, changes in land use, depletion of freshwater resources, and pollution of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems through excessive nitrogen and phosphorus inputs. Here we show that between 2010 and 2050, as a result of expected changes in population and income levels, the environmental effects of the food system could increase by 50-90% in the absence of technological changes and dedicated mitigation measures, reaching levels that are beyond the planetary boundaries that define a safe operating space for humanity. We analyse several options for reducing the environmental effects of the food system, including dietary changes towards healthier, more plant-based diets, improvements in technologies and management, and reductions in food loss and waste.

Coordinating AgMIP data and models across global and regional scales for 1.5°C and 2.0°C assessments.

The Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP) has developed novel methods for Coordinated Global and Regional Assessments (CGRA) of agriculture and food security in a changing world. The present study aims to perform a proof of concept of the CGRA to demonstrate advantages and challenges of the proposed framework. This effort responds to the request by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for the implications of limiting global temperature increases to 1.

Biophysical and economic implications for agriculture of +1.5° and +2.0°C global warming using AgMIP Coordinated Global and Regional Assessments.

This study presents results of the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP) Coordinated Global and Regional Assessments (CGRA) of +1.5° and +2.0°C global warming above pre-industrial conditions.

Linking regional stakeholder scenarios and shared socioeconomic pathways: Quantified West African food and climate futures in a global context.

The climate change research community's shared socioeconomic pathways (SSPs) are a set of alternative global development scenarios focused on mitigation of and adaptation to climate change. To use these scenarios as a global context that is relevant for policy guidance at regional and national levels, they have to be connected to an exploration of drivers and challenges informed by regional expertise. In this paper, we present scenarios for West Africa developed by regional stakeholders and quantified using two global economic models, GLOBIOM and IMPACT, in interaction with stakeholder-generated narratives and scenario trends and SSP assumptions.

Food system consequences of a fungal disease epidemic in a major crop.

Fungal diseases are major threats to the most important crops upon which humanity depends. Were there to be a major epidemic that severely reduced yields, its effects would spread throughout the globalized food system. To explore these ramifications, we use a partial equilibrium economic model of the global food system (IMPACT) to study a hypothetical severe but short-lived epidemic that reduces rice yields in the countries affected by 80%.

Can sub-Saharan Africa feed itself?

Although global food demand is expected to increase 60% by 2050 compared with 2005/2007, the rise will be much greater in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Indeed, SSA is the region at greatest food security risk because by 2050 its population will increase 2.5-fold and demand for cereals approximately triple, whereas current levels of cereal consumption already depend on substantial imports.

Global and regional health effects of future food production under climate change: a modelling study.

Background: One of the most important consequences of climate change could be its effects on agriculture. Although much research has focused on questions of food security, less has been devoted to assessing the wider health impacts of future changes in agricultural production. In this modelling study, we estimate excess mortality attributable to agriculturally mediated changes in dietary and weight-related risk factors by cause of death for 155 world regions in the year 2050.