News

"Agriculture’s heavy dependence on fossil fuels is undermining the sector’s ability to feed the world, perpetuating poverty and undermining efforts to build a more sustainable world economy, FAO said today. The warning came as the UN Food and Agriculture Organization released a study on “energy-smart” food production and use ahead of the Rio+20 conference on sustainable development, where global energy challenges will figure high on the agenda. Together, the world’s food production systems — from the farms where food is grown to further along the processing and marketing chain — consume 30 percent of all available energy, FAO’s study shows. Most of that energy consumption — 70 percent — happens after food leaves farms, as it is transported, processed, packed, shipped, stored, marketed and prepared. And a significant amount of all energy used in the food chain — about 40 percent — is simply lost due to food losses and waste (globally one third of all food, around 1.3 billion tons, is thrown away or lost to spoilage each year.) Meanwhile, almost 3 billion people have limited access to modern energy services for heating and cooking, and 1.4 billion have zero or limited access to electricity, FAO’s report notes. “Higher costs of oil and natural gas, insecurity regarding the limited reserves of these non-renewable resources and the global consensus on the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, could hamper global efforts to meet the growing demand for food, unless the agrifood chain is decoupled from fossil fuel use,” it says. The report also points out that without access to electricity and sustainable energy sources, communities have little chance to achieve food security, and no opportunities for securing productive livelihoods that can lift them out of poverty.”