More than 150 Nobel Prize-winning scientists and World Food Prize winners affirm that significant investments across the entire food value chain—along with substantial research efforts—are imperative to prevent global famine by the middle of this century.
The signatories of an open letter entitled “Towards a World Without Hunger” warn: “We are not in a position to meet future food needs. We are not even close to doing so.”
The signatories include such prominent figures as Robert Woodrow Wilson, Nobel Prize winner in Physics; Wole Soyinka, Nobel Prize winner in Literature; Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Prize winner in Economics; and several World Food Prize winners, including Cary Fowler, who served as the outgoing U.S. Special Envoy for Global Food Security.
The food insecurity crisis ahead
Extreme weather events associated with climate change and population growth—by 2050, the Earth will have 1.5 billion more inhabitants than today—contribute to a grim outlook for food production and access.
Furthermore, soil erosion, land degradation, biodiversity loss, water scarcity, market pressures, conflicts, and policies that limit innovation exacerbate this situation, the letter warns.
A “vicious cycle of conflict and food insecurity” is exacerbating a situation where approximately 350 million people do not know where their next mean will come from and 60 million children under five suffer from stunting (lifelong cognitive and physical disability) due to nutritional deficiencies.
Noting that 700 million people are currently food insecure and desperately poor, the award winning scientists assert that “as difficult and uncomfortable as it may be to imagine, humanity is heading towards an even more unstable and food-insecure world by the middle of this century.
Strategies to prevent global famine, according to science
Faced with this situation, scientists are calling for priority to be given to agricultural research and development, as well as to the dissemination of the progress achieved globally.
Efforts to “reverse our current trajectory toward a tragic mismatch between global food supply and demand” must be “decisive,” “transformative,” and “respectful of the planet,” and must encompass “the entire food value chain, from inputs to production and post-harvest,” they emphasize.
Among other objectives, the proposals include improving photosynthesis in crops such as wheat and rice, biological nitrogen fixation in major cereals, transforming annual crops into perennial ones, and developing new and forgotten crops.
Also considered are innovations in various cultivation systems, the improvement of fruits and vegetables to optimize storage and shelf life, the creation of nutrient-rich foods from microorganisms and fungi, and the study and development of strategies to ensure that the fruits of these scientific research initiatives reach and benefit those most in need.
Also under consideration are innovations in various cultivation systems, the improvement of fruits and vegetables to optimize storage and shelf life, the creation of nutrient-rich foods from microorganisms and fungi, and the study and development of strategies to ensure that the fruits of these scientific research initiatives reach and benefit those most in need.