{"id":60863,"date":"2021-12-10T08:40:07","date_gmt":"2021-12-10T13:40:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=60863"},"modified":"2021-12-10T08:40:07","modified_gmt":"2021-12-10T13:40:07","slug":"natural-resources-necessary-to-feed-world-are-at-a-breaking-point-warns-fao","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=60863","title":{"rendered":"Natural Resources Necessary to Feed World Are at a ‘Breaking Point,’ Warns FAO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Natural Resources Necessary to Feed World Are at a ‘Breaking Point,’ Warns FAO<\/a><\/h3>\n
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“Taking care of land, water, and particularly the long-term health of soils is fundamental to accessing food in an ever-demanding food chain.”<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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A United Nations report<\/strong>\u00a0released Thursday detailing humanity’s degradation of natural resources warns swift and sweeping reforms are needed to keep feeding the growing global population.<\/p>\n

“The pressures on land and water ecosystems are now intense, and many are stressed to a critical point.”<\/p>\n

The new U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report argues that “a sense of urgency needs to prevail over a hitherto neglected area of public policy and human welfare, that of caring for the long-term future of land, soil, and water.”<\/p>\n

“Taking care of land, water, and particularly the long-term health of soils,” the publication explains, “is fundamental to accessing food in an ever-demanding food chain, guaranteeing nature-positive production, advancing equitable livelihoods, and building resilience to shocks and stresses arising from natural disasters and pandemics.”<\/p>\n

Entitled\u00a0The State of the World’s Land and Water Resources for Food and Agriculture: Systems at breaking point<\/a>\u00a0(SOLAW 2021)<\/em>, the report declares that “time is of the essence.”<\/p>\n

That tone is echoed by FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu in a foreword to the report, which he says provides “evidence of the changing and alarming trends in resource use.”<\/p>\n

“The pressures on land and water ecosystems are now intense, and many are stressed to a critical point,” Qu writes. “It is clear our future food security will depend on safeguarding our land, soil, and water resources.”<\/p>\n

Already, human-induced soil degradation affects 34% of land used for food while water scarcity threatens 3.2 billion people\u2014nearly half the total human population\u2014in agricultural areas, according to\u00a0SOLAW 2021<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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