The world has entered an era of \u201cpeak food\u201d production with an array of staples from corn and rice to wheat and chicken slowing in growth \u2013 with potentially disastrous consequences for feeding the planet.<\/p>\n
New research finds that the supply of 21 staples, such as eggs, meat, vegetables and soybeans is already beginning to run out of momentum, while the global population continues to soar.<\/p>\n
Peak chicken was in 2006, while milk and wheat both peaked in 2004 and rice peaked way back in 1988, according to new research from Yale University, Michigan State University and the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research in Germany.<\/p>\n
What makes the report particularly alarming is that so many crucial sources of food have peaked in a relatively short period of history, the researchers said.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople often talk of substitution. If we run out of one substance we just substitute another. But if multiple resources are running out, we\u2019ve got a problem. Mankind needs to accept that renewable raw materials are reaching their yield limits worldwide,\u201d said Jianguo \u201cJack\u201d Liu, of Michigan State University.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a strong reason for integration … rather than searching for a one-for-one substitution to offset shortages,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust nine or 10 plants species feed the world. But we found there\u2019s a peak for all these resources. Even renewable resources won\u2019t last forever,\u201d said Ralf Seppelt, of the Helmholtz Centre.<\/p>\n
The research, published in the journal Ecology and Society, finds that 16 of the 21 foods examined reached peak production between 1988 and 2008.<\/p>\n
The simultaneous peaking of crops and livestock comes against a backdrop of a growing population, which is expected to reach nine billion by 2050, requiring the world to produce twice as much food by then as it does now, according to a separate study by the California Academy of Sciences.<\/p>\n
The problems caused by the growing population have been compounded by the growth of wealthy middle-class populations in countries such as China and India which are demanding a meatier diet. This is problematic because meat and dairy use up a lot more resources than if a comparable level of nutrition were provided by crops, grown direct for human consumption.<\/p>\n
Source: The Independent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The world has entered an era of \u201cpeak food\u201d production with an array of staples from corn and rice to wheat and chicken slowing in growth \u2013 with potentially disastrous consequences for feeding the planet. New research finds that the supply of 21 staples, such as eggs, meat, vegetables and soybeans is already beginning to … Continue reading “Peak food: Shortages loom as global production slows”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2961,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,123],"tags":[10911,10913,10908,10912,10909,10910],"class_list":["post-17582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-world","tag-crops","tag-diet","tag-global-population","tag-livestock","tag-peak-food","tag-shortages"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2961"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17582"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17583,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17582\/revisions\/17583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}