Articles

African swine fever has spread to all Chinese provinces, limiting pork production and trade. Outbreaks occurring between 2018 and 2019 led to economic losses in pork and related industries—but projected future outbreaks could cause greater economic impacts.

The combination of hot and dry conditions reduces crop yields through heat and drought stresses. The heat sensitivity of crops depends on the local strength of couplings between temperature and moisture, but how future climate will impact the temperature–moisture couplings remains unknown. On the basis of historical patterns and a suite of climate models, this study projects that climate change will modify the couplings and probably worsen the impacts of warming on some of the world’s most important crops.

The nutritional, economic and livelihood contributions provided by aquatic food systems are threatened by climate change. Building climate resilience requires systemic interventions that reduce social vulnerabilities.

The quantification of greenhouse gas emissions related to food production and consumption is still largely hindered by the availability of spatial data consistent across sectors. This study provides a detailed account of emissions from land-use change, farmland, livestock and activities beyond the farm gate associated with plant- and animal-based foods/diets—culminating in local-, country- and global-level emissions from each major agricultural commodity.

Increasing nitrogen use efficiency is the most effective strategy to reduce undernourishment while respecting the nitrogen boundaries in regions such as China and India. This supply-side effort plays a more important role in alleviating food insecurity than demand-side efforts such as diet shifts and reduced waste when introducing regional nitrogen targets.

Biodiversity in food systems is key to ensuring healthier diets, more sustainable food production and increased resilience to environmental and socio-economic disturbances. On the basis of a comprehensive scoring framework, the Agrobiodiversity Index proposed in this study gives a clear picture of agrobiodiversity at the country level as well as guidance to enhance it.

Higher income is associated with healthier, but more environmentally detrimental, diets in the United States. Healthy diets with lower environmental impacts are achievable within current food budgets for the majority of the population, but are unaffordable for 38% of Black and Hispanic people in the lowest income and education groups.

Forced labour in agriculture is a threat to the sustainability of food systems. With distinct datasets and a new forced labour risk scoring method, this study demonstrates that while many commodities are at higher risk, a small number of commodities account for substantial fractions of the risk embedded in the US retail fruit and vegetable supplies.

Dietary changes are needed for greater nutrition and sustainability, yet it remains unclear how drastic these changes must be. Combining a new epidemiology-based nutritional index and 18 environmental indicators, this study estimates the positive impact of specific food substitutions.

The policy of integrating potato as a staple of the diet in China has potential to improve food security. Here, it is shown that successful integration may also reduce total carbon–land–water impacts of staple crops in China by up to 25% by 2030.

The potential environmental consequences driven by US–China crop trade tension are considerable and could spill over to other countries, especially Brazil and other South American countries, through international trade. Such consequences are predominantly driven by China’s proposed retaliation on US soybeans.

Subnational data indicate that the increasing frequency of food-security crises since 2014 is more attributable to conflict in South Sudan and Nigeria than to drought or locust swarms, with pastoralists remaining more vulnerable to drought than those in agricultural zones.

The world’s future food security will certainly be affected by extreme climate events, yet the location and magnitude of their impact are often overlooked. Using crop yield and food need projections under different socioeconomic conditions, this study estimates the share of the population at the risk of hunger under high and low greenhouse gas emission scenarios in the face of climate extremes.

Widespread use of antimicrobials in animals raised for food is driving antimicrobial resistance. Geographically targeted surveillance efforts could allow for prioritized intervention and preserve antimicrobial effectiveness.

Across 57 global food security projection and quantitative scenario studies that have been published in the past two decades, the total global food demand is expected to rise from +35% to +56% between 2010 and 2050, and the population at risk of hunger is expected to change by −91% to +8%. Both ranges are substantially lower than previous projections.

Impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on maternal and child nutrition outcomes, and productivity losses due to childhood stunting and mortality, in 118 low- and middle-income countries are projected under optimistic, moderate and pessimistic scenarios. Six nutrition interventions to mitigate excess stunting and child mortality are financially costed.

Existing datasets of nitrogen (N) balance in agriculture are often discrepant. Comparing 13 of them regarding five metrics (fertilizer application, manure application, biological N fixation, atmospheric deposition, and N harvested as crop products) over 1961–2015 reveals why. Recommendations for improving N quantification and an N budget benchmark dataset are also proposed.

Characterizing and quantifying food loss and waste (FLW) is key to the design of sustainable food systems. Based on field surveys and literature review, this study provides data on FLW in China for several commodities at specific stages of the food supply chain. Associated environmental footprints are also calculated under baseline conditions and for three hypothetical scenarios of FLW reduction, revealing the effectiveness of different intervention levels.

The seed coating consists of a silk/trehalose inner layer containing rhizobacteria and a pectin/carboxymethylcellulose outer layer that reswells upon sowing and acts as a water jacket. Coated common bean seeds showed better plant establishment in semi-arid soil.

Population growth and associated increases in food and feed demand may drive cropland expansion at the expense of natural area and biodiversity, as well as higher greenhouse gas emissions. This study shows how a more efficient and better targeted use of phosphorus is key to avoiding such environmental problems.