Abstract
Achieving global food security requires a new approach that integrates not only all aspects of the growing, harvesting and processing of food (necessary to ensure sufficient affordable and sustainable production to alleviate hunger) but also the complexities associated with food consumption including deterring unhealthy overconsumption. Inefficiencies occur at various points along the agri-food supply chain but at present they are inadequately conceptualized via separate accounts of food loss, food waste, supply chain management, and public health. Here we re-define food loss and waste through the concept of conversion efficiency applied to the entire system, an approach up to now only applied to the primary processes of crop productivity. Nine conversion efficiencies are defined: sunlight capture efficiency; photosynthesis use efficiency; biomass allocation efficiency; harvesting efficiency; storage and distribution efficiency; processing efficiency; retailing efficiency; consumption efficiency; and dietary efficiency. Using the production and consumption of bread in the UK as an example, we demonstrate how efficiencies may be estimated and thus where the main inefficiencies lie, so indicating where the most significant improvements could be made. We suggest that our approach, which introduces the term Food Chain Inefficiency (FCI) to re-define food loss and waste, provides a rational and effective way to devise the practical interventions and policies needed to deliver a sustainable agri-food system.
Highlights
Providing food security for the growing human population without widespread environmental degradation is one of the biggest challenges of the twenty-first century (Godfray et al, 2010), one which underpins many of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (Rockström and Sukhdev, 2016)
Progress will only be made if the many parts of the agri-food system are viewed as a whole (Horton et al, 2017), with integrated, joined up thinking across the issues of environment and biodiversity to all aspects of the growing, harvesting and processing of food, and the processes associated with food consumption including nutrition and health
The comprehensive rationalization of the wastes and losses in the agri-food system into a series of process conversion efficiencies allows analysis to determine how best to bring about improvements
Summary
Providing food security for the growing human population without widespread environmental degradation is one of the biggest challenges of the twenty-first century (Godfray et al, 2010), one which underpins many of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (Rockström and Sukhdev, 2016). The agri-food system is the largest single contributor of greenhouse gases, a significant source of pollution of land, water courses and oceans, and depletes non-renewable resources. It relies upon input of unsustainable amounts of agrochemicals, leading to a degradation of the soil upon which it depends (Horton, 2017). Progress will only be made if the many parts of the agri-food system are viewed as a whole (Horton et al, 2017), with integrated, joined up thinking across the issues of environment and biodiversity to all aspects of the growing, harvesting and processing of food, and the processes associated with food consumption including nutrition and health. Scientific and technical knowledge has to be considered in a political, cultural, and economic context (Horton and Brown, 2018)
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