Minimizing threats towards food security are essential in order to eliminate hunger and poverty in the future. Maybe the biggest and most severe challenge threatening food security is climate. Today agriculture is responsible for about 30-‐35% of the global green house gas emissions mostly as a result of tropical deforestation, nitrous oxide emission from inorganic fertilized soil and methane emission from livestock and rice cultivation. This is extremely high, and may contribute to increasing temperature, rising sea level and more frequent extreme weather such as drought, flooding and typhoons (Foley et al. 2011). These are all factors influencing the local, national and global production capacity. About 40-‐50% of crops today are wasted, either because they are destroyed, or are wasted because of standards and requirements of the products. This accounts for more than 1.3 tons of food every year (FAO 2015g), which could have contributed to feed a growing population and release pressure on recourses and climate.
Due to short-‐term volatility in supply and future price trends as a result of climate changes, the whole food system may be at risk. However, the potential impacts are unclear, especially at regional scales. But it is likely that changes in climate will increase and affect food insecurity in areas already vulnerable, that are already suffering from hunger and malnutrition (Wheeler and von Braun 2013). Climate changes might result in lower output of production, and consequences such as higher food prices will make food unavailable to more people. Extensive challenges in an already exposed situation, results in more people falling into poverty. Climate changes will indirectly be responsible for food insecurity, and in a position to interrupt the progress towards reaching the two first SDG targets (2014b), ending poverty in all its forms everywhere, and eventually a world without hunger.12 Poor and underdeveloped countries are the countries most vulnerable and least fitted to adapt to these changes. This shows the importance of global cooperation and initiatives directed towards an environmental friendly and sustainable future, and the development of the SDGs.
Agricultural challenges that we experience today are different from anything experienced earlier, and new and innovative approaches are needed (Foley et al. 2011). A world with changing climate, population growth and increased consumption, requires new tactics, thus it is important to find new sources of unused natural resources, adapt new technology, reduce waste, transfer knowledge and develop guidelines to follow. Exploiting unused natural resources in the sea, which holds a great potential as a future food source. Southeast Asia, for instance, has enormous amounts of untapped marine resources, which is elaborated in paragraph 4.1.4.
Hunger reduction and increasing people’s livelihoods means increased consumption and transformation to high-‐value food products, such as meat and dietary products. It requires more energy to produce, and is often less environmentally friendly. This is a challenge that brings up the questions: can we unite poverty reduction with sustainable development? The solutions are political and require a cross-‐sectorial collaboration, with a diversity of voices and approaches towards sustainable development. To achieve sustainable development it is crucial to empower farmers to provide for themselves, their communities and for export markets. This may provide lasting benefits, which makes it is necessary to include them in global conversations, ascertaining their needs, and the solutions to those needs in a sustainable manner. This
will be a central element in LAMTIB, to coordinate and include the small and fragile farmers in the global debates and find practical, sustainable solutions to the problems (Preststulen 2015).
Population growth, increased consumption and waste are severe challenge to overcome. Increased consumption and living standards does, unfortunately, also bring increased waste among the consumers, and with more people on the planet increasing their consumption, waste will only become a more extensive issue. Wasted food in one way or another is potential food for an increasing population, and decreasing waste will be environmental friendly and contribute to sustainable food security.
Increasing population and consumption are placing unpredicted demands on agriculture and natural recourses. Today, approximately a billion people are chronically malnourished while our agricultural systems are concurrently degrading land, water, biodiversity and climate on a global scale. To meet the world’s future food security and sustainability needs, food production must grow substantially while, at the same time, agriculture’s environmental footprint must shrink dramatically (Foley et al 2011:377).
Directing attention towards developing regions and especially Southeast Asia is crucial as it is estimated that 90% of the future population growth will occur there (Srivatsan 2014). Southeast Asia has enormous potential exploiting unused natural resources and aquaculture, and has a great potential to overcome current and future challenges regarding food security in a combination of population growth and climate changes. However good management of natural resources are key.
To decrease the differences in the world and alleviate poverty, many approaches and theories have been developed. The powerful, industrialised countries have always made the rules, and been the main donors in aid and development support. The agricultural sector are most exposed to reforms, and countries that earlier were self-‐ sufficient are now forced to switch to cash rich crops, and more tradable farming, which resulted in a switch from food crops such as maize to cotton for export. This led to a rapid drop in global cotton prices, and nations ended up in famine, which was the case in Sudan (Chant and McIlwaine 2009).
Land usages for non-‐food commodities are threatening the global food security. Nations might prioritise other agricultural products, such as biofuel or cotton. “In the developing world, the power of capital and expertise drive international traders and operators to source marine and dry land resources, leaving often unstable low margins with the rural population, and in many cases, over-‐exploiting natural resources, also in an
unsustainable manner” (Preststulen 2015). Larger competition for land to produce food will increase the pressure on resources, resulting in increased food prices when less food is available at the global market, and an increased dependency on food import to secure the population sufficient access to food. This illustrates how important a sustainable and environmental friendly food production is in a world where free trade does not exist in its full potential. Increased agricultural productivity will ensure more food available on the global market, and keep the food prices stabile and low.