Linkages between sustainable consumption and sustainable production: some suggestions for foresight work

Abstract

The authors investigate how consumption and production of agricultural products have developed in the past and could possibly evolve in the future. The main focus is on changing consumption patterns and the consequences for food security and for the pressure on natural resources. In this context, the question is raised as to how foresight work can reflect the mechanisms by which a transition towards more sustainable consumption can influence the sustainability of the production systems. The authors first analyze the main drivers of the past and future evolution of food systems and then the implications for foresight analysis. An attempt is made to identify specific issues and policies that should be further analyzed. In particular, future foresight will be challenged to incorporate the interactions between consumption and production more explicitly and to address four issues: (i) intra-national heterogeneity of diets and resulting nutritional outcomes, (ii) externalities resulting from the process of production, processing, and marketing along the product chain, (iii) competition between food and non-food uses of agricultural commodities and between agricultural and non-agricultural use of land and (iv) mechanisms by which food scarcity causes hunger and malnutrition.