Food Production and The EnvironmentChapter 10

Many people suffer from chronic health and malnutrition

Food security means having daily access to enough nutritious food to live an active healthy lifestyle

1 of every 6 people in less-developed countries are not getting enough to eat, facing insecurities of living in hunger and poor nutrition

This is also threatening their ability to lead healthy and productive lives.

The root and cause of food insecurity is poverty

Other obstacles to food security are political upheaval, war, corruption, bad weather, including drought, floods, and heat waves

To maintain good health, and resist disease, individuals need large amounts of macronutrients, such as carbohydrates, proteins and fats, and smaller amounts of micronutrients, such as vitamins and minerals

People who cannot grow or buy enough food to meet their basic energy needs suffer from chronic hunger

Many suffer from chronic malnutrition, which is a deficiency of protein and other nutrients, which weakens them, making them more vulnerable to disease. It also hinders the normal physical and mental development of children

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in 2010, there were an estimated 925 million chronically undernourished or malnourished people.

Many people suffer from a deficiency of one or more vitamins and minerals, which are usually vitamin A, iron and iodine

Some 250,000-500,000 children younger than age 6 go blind each year from a lack of Vitamin A, and within a year, more than half of them will die

Lack of iron causes anemia which causes fatigue, makes infection more likely, and increases a woman's chance of dying from hemorrhage from childbirth

1 in 5 people in the world suffer from iron deficiency

Chronic lack of iodine can stunt peoples growth, cause mental retardation, and can cause a goiter

Almost one-third of the worlds people do not get enough iodine in their food and water

According to the FAO and WHO, eliminating serious health problems would cost an equivalent of only 2-3 cents per year for every person in the world

Many health problems also arise from eating too much

Over nutrition occurs when food energy intakes exceeds energy use and causes excess body fat

People who are underfed and underweight and those who are overfed and overweight face similar health problems such as: lower life expectancy, greater susceptibility to disease and illness, and lower productivity and life quality

Globally about 925 million people have health problems because they do not get enough to eat, and about 1.1 billion people face health problems from eating too much

About 68% of American adults are overweight, and half of those people are obese

Obesity plays a role in four of the top ten causes of death in the United States such as: heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and some forms of cancer

Food production today has increased drastically compared to what it used to be

10,000 years ago, humans began to shift from hunting for and gathering food to growing it and raising animals for food and labor

Today, we have 3 systems to supply our food: Croplands produce mostly grains; rangelands, pastures, and feedlots produce meat; and fisheries and agriculture provide us with seafood

66% of the worlds population survives primarily by eating these 3 main crops- rice, wheat, and corn

Only a few species of mammals and fish provide most of the worlds meat and seafood

Since 1960, there has been an increase in the global food production system because of technological advances, which are: tractors, farm machinery, high tech fishing equipment, irrigation, inorganic fertilizers, pesticides, high yield grains, and industrialized production of livestock and fish

Industrialized crop production relies on high-input monocultures

Industrialized agriculture, or high input agriculture, uses heavy equipment and large amounts of financial capital, fossil fuel, water, commercial fertilizers, and pesticides to produce single crops, or monocultures

Major goal of industrialized agriculture is to increase yield, the amount of food produced per unit of land

About 25% of the worlds cropland, mostly in more-developed countries, and produces 80% of the worlds food

Plantation agriculture is a form of industrialized agriculture used primarily in tropical less-developed countries. They grow banana’s, soybean, sugarcane, coffee, palm oil, and vegetables.

Modern industrialized agriculture violates 3 principals of sustainability by relying heavily on fossil fuels, reducing natural crop diversity, and neglecting the conservation and recycling of nutrients in topsoil.

Traditional agriculture often relies on low-input polycultures

Traditional agriculture provides 20% of the worlds food crops on about 75% of its cultivated land, in less-developed countries

There are 2 main types of traditional agriculture:

1. Traditional subsistence agriculture supplements energy from the sun with the labor of humans and draft animals to produce enough crops for a farm family's survival, with little leftover to sell or store as a reserve for hard times

In traditional intensive agriculture, farmers increase their inputs of human and draft animal labor, animal manure for fertilizer, and water to obtain higher crop yields, some of which can be sold for income

2. Many traditional farmers grow several crops on the same plot simultaneously, a practice known as polyculture

Crop diversity reduces the chance of losing most or all of the years food supply to pests, bad weather, and other misfortunes

Crops mature at different times, provide food throughout the year, reduce the input of human labor, and keep the soil covered to reduce erosion from wind and water

Lessens the need for fertilizer and water, because root systems at different depths in the soil capture nutrients and moisture efficiently

Insecticides and herbicides are rarely needed because multiple habitats are created for natural predators of crop-eating insects, and weeds have trouble competing with multiuse of crop plants

On average, such low-input polyculture produces higher yields than does high-input monoculture

Farmers can produce more and more by increasing their land on their yields per acre

Since 1950, about 88% of the increase in global food production has come from using high input industrialized agriculture to yield in a process called green evolution

3 steps to a Green Revolution

1. First, develop and plant monocultures of selectively bred or genetically engineered varieties of key crops such as rice, wheat and corn

2 Second, produce high yields by using large inputs of water any synthetic inorganic fertilizers, and pesticides

3. Third, increase the number of crops grown per year on a plot of land through multiple cropping

The first green revolution used high input agriculture to dramatically increase crop yields in most of the worlds more developed countries , especially the United States, between 1950 and 1970

A second green evolution has been taking place since 1967. Fast growing varieties of rice and wheat, specially bred for tropical and subtropical climates, have been introduced into middle income, less developed countries such as India, China, and Brazil

Producing more food on less land has helped to protect some biodiversity by preserving large areas of forests, grasslands, wetlands, and easily eroded mountain terrain that might otherwise be used for farming

Largely because of the two green revolutions, world grain production has tripled 1961 and 2009

People directly consume about 48% of the worlds grain production. About 35% is used to feed livestock and indirectly consume by people who eat meat and meat products. The remaining 17% (Mostly corn) is used to make biofuels such as ethanol for cars and other vehicles

In the United States, industrialized farming has evolved into agribusiness, as a smaller number of giant multinational corporations increasingly control the growing, processing, distribution, and sale of food in U.S. and global markets

Since 1950 U.S. industrialized agriculture has been more than doubled the yields of key crops such as wheat, corn, and soybeans, without cultivating more land

Americans spend only about 13% of their disposable income on food, compared to the percentages up to 50% that China and India and most other less-developed countries have to pay for food.

Crossbreeding and genetic engineering produce varieties of crops and livestock

Crossbreeding through artificial selection has been used for centuries by farmers and scientists to develop genetically improve varieties of crops and livestock

Such selective breeding in the first gene revolution has yielded amazing results; ancient ears of corn were about the size of your little finger, and wild tomatoes were once the size of grapes

Traditional crossbreeding is a slow process, typically taking 15 or more years to produce a commercially valuable new crop, and it can combine traits only from species that are genetically similar

Resulting varieties remain useful for only 5-10 years before pests and diseases reduce their effectiveness

Modern scientists are creating a second gene revolution by using genetic engineering to develop genetically improved strains of crop or livestock

Genetic engineering involves altering an organisms genetic material through adding or deleting, or changing segments of DNA to produce desirable traits or to eliminate undesirable ones- a process that is also called gene splicing; resulting in genetically modified organisms

Developing a new crop variety through gene splicing is faster for selective breeding, usually costs less, and allows for insertion of genes from almost any other organism into crop cells

Currently, at least 70% of the food products on U.S. supermarket shelves contain some form of genetically engineered food or ingredients, but no law requires the labeling of these products.

Certified organic food, which is labeled, does not use genetically modified seeds or ingredients.

Bioengineers plan to develop new GM varieties of crops that are resistant to heat, cold, pesticides, parasites, viral disease, drought, and salty or acidic soil.

Meat and animal products such as eggs and milk are good sources of protein and represent the worlds second major food producing system.

Between 1961 and 2010, world meat productions, mostly beef, pork and poultry have increased more than four fold and average meat consumption per person more than doubled.

Global meat production is likely to double by 2050 as affluence rises in middle income people begin to consume more meat and animal products in developing countries such as China and India.

Half the worlds meat comes from livestock grazing on grass in unfenced rangelands and enclosed pastures.

The other half of meat is produced an industrialized system in which animals are raised in feedlots, where they are fed grain, fish meal, fish oil, which are usually doctored with growth hormones and antibiotics.

Feedlots, and the animal waste and runoff associated with them, creates serious environmental impacts on the air and water.

The worlds third major food system consists of fisheries and aquaculture.

A fishery is a concentration of particular aquatic species suitable for commercial harvesting in a given ocean area or inland body of water.

Industrial fleets harvest most of the worlds marine catch of wild fish.

Fish and shellfish are also produced through aquaculture- the practice of raising marine and freshwater fish in freshwater ponds and rice paddies or in underwater cages in coastal waters or in deeper ocean waters.

Some fishery scientists warn that unless we reduce overfishing and ocean pollution, and slow projected climate changes, that most of the worlds major commercial ocean fisheries could collapse by 2050.

The industrialization of food production has been made possible by the availability of energy, mostly from nonrenewable oil and natural gas.

Energy is needed to run farm machinery, irrigate crops, and produce synthetic pesticides and synthetic inorganic fertilizers, as well as to process food and transport it long distances within and between countries.

As a result, processing, producing, transporting, and consuming industrialized food results in a large energy loss.

Producing food has major environmental impacts such as limiting future food production by making it unsustainable

Soil is The Base of Life on Land Soil is a complex mixture of eroded rock, mineral nutrients, decaying

organic matter, water, air, and billions of living organisms, most of them microscopic decomposers

Soils formation begins when bedrock is slowly broken down into fragments and particles by physical, chemical, and biological processes, called weathering

All terrestrial life depends on soil, it is a key component of the earths natural capital. It supplies most of the nutrients needed for plant growth and purifies and stores water, while organisms living in the soil help to control the earths climate by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere storing it as organic compounds

Most soils that have developed over a long period of time, called nature soils, contain horizontal layers, or horizons

The root of most plants and the majority of a soils organic matter are concentrated in a soils two upper layers, the O horizon of leaf litter and the horizon A of topsoil

In most soils, these two layers team with bacteria, fungi, earthworms, and small insects, all interacting in complex ways

Porous mixture of the partially decomposed bodies of dead plants and animals, called humus, and inorganic materials such as clay, silt, and sand

The B horizon (subsoil) and the C horizon (parent material) contain most of a soils inorganic matter, mostly broken down rock consisting of various mixtures of sand, silt, clay and gravel

The spaces, or pores, between the sold organic and inorganic particles in the upper and lower soil layers containing various amounts of air (mostly nitrogen and oxygen gas) and water

Although topsoil is a renewable resource, it is renewed very slowly, which means it can be depleted. Just one centimeter of topsoil can take hundreds of years to form, but it can be washed or blown away in a matter of weeks to months when we plow grassland or clear a forest and leave its topsoil unprotected.

Desertification in arid and semiarid parts of the world threaten livestock and crop contributions to the worlds food supply.

Desertification occurs when the productive potential of the topsoil falls by 10% or more because of prolonged drought and human activities.

Irrigation is important in boosting productivity of farms; roughly 20% of the worlds cropland that is irrigated accounts for 45% of the worlds food.

Most irrigation water is a dilute solution of various salts that are picked up as the water flows over or through soil and rocks.

Repeated annual applications of irrigation water in dry climates leads to the gradual accumulation of salts in the upper soils layers- a soil degeneration process called salinization that stunts crop growth, lowers crop yields on at least 10% of the worlds irrigated cropland, and almost 25% of irrigated cropland in the United States.

Excessive irrigation contributes to depletion of groundwater and surface water supplies.

Agriculture activities create a great deal of air pollution.

They account for more than 25% of the human-generated emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

Industrialized livestock production alone generates about 18% of the worlds greenhouse gases; cattle and dairy cows release the greenhouse gas methane and methane is generated by liquid animal manure stored in waste lagoons.

Nitrous oxide, with about 300 times the warming capacity of CO2 per molecule, is released in huge quantities by synthetic organic fertilizers as well as by livestock manure.

Natural biodiversity and some ecological services are threatened when forests are cleared and grasslands are plowed up and replaced with croplands used to produce food or biofuels, such as ethanol.

There is an increasing loss of agro biodiversity, the worlds genetic variety of animal and plant species.

In the United States, about 97% of the food plant variations that were available to farmers in the 1940s no longer exist, except perhaps in small amounts in seed banks and in the backyards of a few gardeners.

The worlds genetic library, which is critical for increasing food yields, is rapidly shrinking.

There is controversy over genetically engineered foods today.

Some consider this food to be dangerous Franken food.

They warn that we know too little about the long term harmful effects to human health and ecosystems from the widespread use of the product.

They also warm that the GM organisms released into the environment may cause some unintended genetic and ecological effects.

Genes in plant pollen from genetically engineered crops can spread among nonengineered species. The new strains can then form hybrids with wild crop varieties, which could reduce the natural genetic biodiversity of wild strains.

Most scientists and economists who have evaluated the genetic engineered products believe that the benefits will outweigh the risks.

Others have serious doubts about the ability of GM crops to increase food security compromised to other more effective and sustainable alternative solutions.

The possible unintended spread of GM crop genes threatens the production of certified organic crops, which must be grown in the absence of such genes.

Because organic farmers have to perform expensive tests to detect GMOs or take costly planting measures to prevent the spread of GMOs to their fields from nearby crop fields, they have to raise the prices of their produce.

This makes it more difficult for organic farmers to compete with the industrial farming operations that generate the GM genes in the first place.