World Trade Organization rules must be reformed to allow governments to build and manage public food reserves, providing a critical tool in preventing or mitigating food crises.

Assumptions built into databases may influence research outcomes and practices. This Perspective identifies and analyses public agricultural data practices in the United States as an under-recognized lever for transformative food systems change.

Chinese agricultural production is key to achieve the country’s 2060 carbon neutrality target. Combining meta-analysis and life-cycle assessment, this study estimates the climate change mitigation potential of straw, biochar, and an integrated biomass pyrolysis and electricity generation system.

Self-reported data can introduce recall bias into population-level nutritional assessments. Wastewater analyses combining metabolomic and genomic techniques can inform nutritional assessments at the population scale and support public health nutrition.

Greenhouse gas emissions due to food loss and waste in supply chain and waste management systems accounted for about half of the global annual greenhouse gas emissions from food systems in 2017. The outcomes of emission intervention strategies depend on temporal, regional and socio-economic conditions.

Self-reported data can introduce recall bias into population-level nutritional assessments. Wastewater analyses combining metabolomic and genomic techniques can inform nutritional assessments at the population scale and support public health nutrition.

The impact of different strategies aimed at reducing meat consumption is context dependent. A randomized control trial using data from 100,000 meals reveals the cost effectiveness of exposing students to a 50 min talk on the consequences of meat consumption for health and climate.

Urban development in China has led to cropland loss and displacement over the past decades. This study uses a model-based approach to estimate spatial flows of grain, disaggregated by transport modal choices and routes, to explore the increase in carbon emission associated with the transport of cereals, tubers and soybean in China over 1990–2015.

Meat taxes could help to induce dietary changes beneficial for the environment, animal welfare and public health. Through a referendum choice experiment, this study examines how level and differentiation of the tax, its justification and behavioural salience impact support for meat taxation in Germany.

Nematode infections of cash crops impact economic well-being and food security in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. This study reports a nature-based technology developed to protect yam seeds from soil-borne pathogens, increase yield and decrease post-harvest losses among smallholder farmers in Benin.

Simplistic oppositions help elicit conceptual differences and may set an analytical framework, but can hardly capture the complexity of food systems or aid the design of systemic solutions.