Living The Future: Who Can Do What to Improve Human and Environmental Health While Securing Nutritious Food?

Abstract

For the first time in human history, we encounter global limits of essential resources and are being challenged by the consequences of man-made climate change, reduced biodiversity and pollution by chemical substances. Feeding the extra 5.5 billion urban people in this century requires transformation of the present unsustainable agrifood system. Residents can take part in this transformation by changing to healthy diets, recycle food waste and come closer to the food markets, while public and private sectors could look for innovative ways to produce food and to design city infrastructure and buildings that will enhance recycling of limited resouces and reduce environmental foot prints. Global data are forthcoming on resources and on causes of human and environmental ill heatlh, making it possible to conjure future resources restrictions and imbalances of nutrients. Today, the global agrifood system contributes more than a quarter of the global GHG emissions, four-fifth of eutrophication and more than nine-tenth of biodiversity losses. Revised diets, reduced food waste and soilless food production will significantly shrink agricultural land use – and proportionally reduce greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity losses. Emerging infrastructure and technologies in combination with recycling of nutrients can close the resource gaps by halving the global demand for fertilisers and still feed the world.