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| 2. |
- Barron, Jennie
(författare)
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The role of water in transforming food systems
- 2022
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 33
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The United Nations Food Systems Summit aimed to chart a path toward transforming food systems toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Despite the essentiality of water for food systems, however, the Summit has not sufficiently considered the role of water for food systems transformation. This focus is even more important due to rapidly worsening climate change and its pervasive impacts on food systems that are mediated through water. To avoid that water "breaks" food systems, key food systems actors should 1) Strengthen efforts to retain water-dependent ecosystems, their functions and services; 2) Improve agricultural water management; 3) Reduce water and food losses beyond the farmgate; 4) Coordinate water with nutrition and health interventions; 5) Increase the environmental sustainability of food systems; 6) Explicitly address social inequities; and 7) Improve data quality and monitoring for water-food system linkages.
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| 3. |
- Birner, Regina, et al.
(författare)
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‘We would rather die from Covid-19 than from hunger’ - Exploring lockdown stringencies in five African countries
- 2021
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 31
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Facing COVID-19, African countries were confronted with a dilemma: enacting strict lockdowns to “flatten the curve” could potentially have large effects on food security. Given this catch-22 situation, there was widespread concern that Africa would suffer most from the pandemic. Yet, emerging evidence in early 2021 showed that COVID-19 morbidity remained low, while “biblical famines” have been avoided so far. This paper explores how five African countries maneuvered around the potentially large trade-offs between public health and food security when designing their policy responses to COVID-19 based on a content analysis of 1188 newspaper articles. The findings show that food security concerns played an important role in the public policy debate and influenced the stringency of lockdowns, especially in more democratic countries.
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| 4. |
- Bommarco, Riccardo, et al.
(författare)
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Exploiting ecosystem services in agriculture for increased food security
- 2018
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 17, s. 57-63
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Despite contributing to economy and food security, Ecosystem Services (ES) are still not fully exploited in agriculture. Instead, external inputs have been used to boost yields, while exacting costs on public goods. Ecological intensification capitalizes on ecosystem services to enhance and stabilize production and reduce the need for external inputs, while sparing the environment. Of particular relevance are biodiversity-based ES connected to soil fertility, pest control and pollination. Ecological intensification is applicable in all regions, but for food security purposes, particular attention should be dedicated to implement it as ecological enhancement in regions with wide yield gaps, coinciding with poor food security. Diversified cropping system show promise to create win-win situations. Knowledge on ecology and socio-economy of ES will be needed, and agricultural research and innovation need to heed to resource use efficiency, production stability, minimal environmental impact, buffering of extreme events and adaptation to local conditions.
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| 5. |
- Corrado, Sara, et al.
(författare)
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Food waste accounting methodologies : Challenges, opportunities, and further advancements
- 2019
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 20, s. 93-100
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- About one third of the food produced globally is wasted along the food chain, representing a burden for the environment and an inefficiency of the food system. Tackling food waste is a priority on the global political agenda to guarantee food security. Defining a methodology for food waste quantification is key to monitoring progress towards the achievement of reduction targets. This paper summarises the outcomes of a workshop on food waste accounting co-organised by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre and Directorate-General on Health and Food Safety with the aim of stimulating harmonisation of methodologies, identifying challenges, opportunities, and further advancement for food waste accounting. The paper presents methodological aspects, e.g. system boundaries, reliability of data, accounting of water flows, to ensure better support to food waste policy design and interventions. It addresses all the actors of the food supply chain, governments, and research institutions. © 2019 The Authors
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| 6. |
- Daum, Thomas, 1990, et al.
(författare)
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Agricultural mechanization in Africa: Myths, realities and an emerging research agenda
- 2020
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 26
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Across Africa, governments, development practitioners and private companies have rediscovered agricultural mechanization as a top priority. In the literature, however, mechanization has largely been neglected following the earlier failures of state-led mechanization programs. In this empirical vacuum, several popular propositions have emerged, such as “mechanization leads to unemployment”. We examine nine such propositions and find that most of them are based on mixed evidence or not supported by evidence at all. Hence, they can be labeled “myths”. Such myths influence policies and programs and, thus, potentially undermine the potential contribution offered by agricultural mechanization in Africa to global food security. We propose a research agenda that aims to resolve controversies and support evidence-based policies for sustainable and inclusive agricultural mechanization.
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| 7. |
- Daum, Thomas, 1990, et al.
(författare)
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Mechanization, digitalization, and rural youth - Stakeholder perceptions on three mega-topics for agricultural transformation in four African countries
- 2022
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 32
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Mechanization, digitalization, and rural youth engagement are central to African agricultural transformation. Each of these topics is associated with debates on opportunities, risks, and appropriate policy actions, which become visible in international research discourses and policy fora. In contrast, little is known about the viewpoints of national stakeholders. This paper explores the viewpoints of 195 respondents from different stakeholders categories in Benin, Kenya, Nigeria, and Mali. The results reveal hitherto neglected aspects, e.g., the role of animal traction, the continued appeal of state-led mechanization, and data sovereignty concerns. Gender, age, and education influence the viewpoints on some topics. Paying attention to local stakeholders can help to choose and design the most promising policies/programs and ensure their implementation on the ground.
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| 8. |
- Frei, Barbara, et al.
(författare)
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A brighter future : Complementary goals of diversity and multifunctionality to build resilient agricultural landscapes
- 2020
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 26
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Humanity places a heavy burden on agricultural landscapes, demanding plentiful food, multiple ecosystem functions, and biodiversity conservation. We quantified areas growing ‘brighter’ and ‘darker’ (i.e., better or worse than expected based on extrinsic constraints) for multifunctionality of ecosystem services (ES) over time across a dynamic agricultural landscape. To explore how areas changing in ES multifunctionality, we likewise explored temporal changes in additional features of resilience in social-ecological systems, including: (1) species functional richness and dispersion, (2) agrodiversity, (3) the diversity of farm characteristics and human demographics in the area, and (4) landscape structure and diversity. We found areas increasing in multifunctionality were likewise becoming more biologically and agriculturally diverse, without large losses in overall food production. This suggests the potential for complementarity among goals of food production, multiple ES, and biological and agricultural diversity for agricultural landscapes. While we cannot distinguish whether diversity is the driver, or the consequence, of ES multifunctionality, we can conclude that building diverse, multifunctional agricultural landscapes are an important goal for general system resilience and the future of food security.
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| 9. |
- Ghosh, Ranjan Kumar, et al.
(författare)
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Food waste due to retail power in supply chains: Evidence from Sweden
- 2019
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Ingår i: Global Food Security. - : Elsevier BV. - 2211-9124. ; 20, s. 1-8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Trading practices such as the take-back agreement (TBA) can become a tool for retailers to exert coercive power over suppliers when market concentration is high. We explore the implications of TBAs for the Swedish bread industry using unique company data from a premium bread supplier and find that powerful buyers over-order and, thereby, waste. This supplier faced 30% returns on total volume produced in the period 2011-2015 and had to bear the entire cost of bread rejections, collection and disposal. It received payment only for bread sold to end-customers, not the quantity supplied. To our knowledge, this is first time there is substantial evidence of the negative consequences such trading practices lead to with respect to waste. The EU has been considering banning the practices of 'forcing the supplier to pay for wasted product' and 'a buyer returning unsold food products to the supplier'. However, such behaviour is very difficult to prove, given that suppliers-buyers are either tied up with bilateral confidential contracts or operate under relational norms. Yet, TBAs are common in certain food supply chains, presenting a global challenge for prevention of food waste and requiring deeper policy engagement.
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| 10. |
- Goddek, Simon, et al.
(författare)
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How greenhouse horticulture in arid regions can contribute to climate-resilient and sustainable food security
- 2023
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Ingår i: GLOBAL FOOD SECURITY-AGRICULTURE POLICY ECONOMICS AND ENVIRONMENT. - 2211-9124. ; 38
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A potential change in climate and temperature could strongly affect weather-related crop losses. Using wastelands to grow crops in controlled greenhouse environments could improve global food security and preserve ecosystems. However, the impact of climate change on additional energy and water requirements of greenhousehorticulture food production is still unknown. Using a greenhouse simulator for four locations (The Netherlands, Spain, Saudi Arabia and Namibia), we show that a rise in outdoor temperatures can be counterbalanced with a more intensive water-based cooling. Between 6.9% and 17.9%, more water is required in the worst-case scenario in the year 2100, while the yield quantity decreases by 3%-6% due to slightly deteriorating growth conditions within the greenhouse. Since cooling systems consume up to 90% of the total water use in desert greenhouses, saltwater cooling could play an essential role in increasing the efficiency and sustainability of greenhouse horticulture systems in arid regions. In this study, we investigate the economic and technical feasibility of such greenhouse systems on a larger scale and show the massive potential of these systems. The developed scenarios demonstrate considerable climate resilience, enabling the cultivation of fresh vegetables in arid and infertile regions both presently and in the future.
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