Study: To feed world, save planet ■

Urges change in food system

By Josephine Marcotty Minneapolis Star Tribune, Scripps Howard News Service

How do you feed 9 billion people without destroying the planet?

Transform the global food system in the next 40 years *by using crops to feed people instead of fattening livestock and producing fuel; eliminate food waste; and overhaul the use of fertilizers like nitrogen that are polluting waters around the world. *(The fact to be learned from the hyperlink above, it requires 10 times the amount of energy to produce the same kcal (calories listed on products nutrition labels are really kilo-calories..not calories) of meat as it does grain....that is the reason most of the world's population survives eating grain, like rice....the amount of energy used to feed 1 person meat could feed 10 people eating rice)

Those are some of the conclusions in a study led by a University of Minnesota researcher published online by the journal Nature. It provides a snapshot of the perilous state of the world’s food system — and how it has changed the face of the planet.

For the past two years Jonathan Foley, the study’s lead author, and a team of 20 scientists from around the world compiled and analyzed international production data to reveal a troubling picture of agriculture.

Today it takes up 38 percent of Earth’s surface, the study found. Worldwide, 70 percent of the grassland, 45 percent of deciduous forests and 27 percent of the tropical forests have been converted to agriculture.

Some regions of the world, like Africa, don’t have nearly enough fertilizer, while others like the United States and China use far too much.

A billion people are starving or malnourished, while another billion are overweight or obese. The population is expected to grow to 9 billion or 10 billion in the coming four or five decades, which will require a doubling of food supplies.

The team came up with a strategy to double the world’s food production while reducing the environmental effects of agriculture.

First, use financial incentives and economic development to stop the conversion of forests to farmland, the paper says. Growth in the food supply must come from improving yields where they are low.

Devoting more cropland to human food production could boost calories produced per person by nearly 50 percent.