“…as painful as foodflation is, it may just be an early ripple of the kind of disruption to the food system that’s coming.”

Eliza Barclay, Introducing the New York Times series, “What to Eat on a Burning Planet”

This summer, while I was thinking about hunger from other directions, I read an op-ed by David Wallace-Wells in the New York Times, “Food as You Know It Is About to Change.” (July 28, 2024) This bombshell of

an article is the first of a series called "What to Eat on a Burning Planet." It is packed with daunting facts too numerous to absorb quickly, but crucial to contemplate. Now I must adjust my thinking about food and feeding people to acknowledge the immense global impact of climate change. What is grown, where it can be grown, how it is distributed and more all will be impacted. As Wallace-Wells notes, in the United States we have become accustomed to the miracle of constant availability, not just of kitchen staples, but of formerly seasonal or exotic fruits and vegetables. It is time to seriously reconsider whether this is sustainable and also look more broadly at the global food situation. The “foodflation” we have experienced coming out of the pandemic may be just the tip of a whole field of icebergs. The global food system is fragile and stressed by a variety of factors.

Chris Barrett, an agricultural economist at Cornell, sees the world already in a “food polycrisis.” Facets of this crisis include among others:

• Long-term patterns of year-on-year improvements in hunger have reversed so that rates of undernourishment globally have grown 21 percent since 2017,
• The rate of agricultural growth is declining while demand is booming,
• Obesity is rising,
• The average micronutrient content of many popular vegetables is decreasing,
• Diet related health problems such as diabetes and heart disease are increasing, and
• More infectious diseases are spilling over from animals to humans.

And then there is climate change.

Consider-- As summers heat up and the timing of rainfall shifts farmers will need to reconsider what to plant on the acres they may have farmed for generations. Wallace-Wells includes eye-opening maps showing the changes that will likely occur in where it will be feasible to grow corn and wheat. Such changes will occur around the world. Climate change effects have already reduced the growth of global agricultural productivity, and climate threats loom larger and larger. Adaptation and innovation, by both farmers and consumers, will help, but the pressures on the system show that things must change to prevent failure. It is really difficult to envision all of the adaptations that will be needed to supply both quantity and nutrition in food worldwide, and yet investment in agricultural research has fallen in this century. Another expert cited, Jonas Jägermeyr of NASA, describes saving the food system as the challenge of our generation. He says we face a “quadruple squeeze” of problems, all of which must be solved.

• Fundamental need for the increased productivity to prevent hunger.
• Risk to ecosystems from fertilizer runoff, deforestation, and other pollution.
• Nutritional deficiency, as foods decline in nutritive value over time. 
• Climate, driving fundamental change in our breadbaskets, across the planet.

I have barely skimmed the surface of these complex issues and the multitude of facts. I encourage you to read the entire article to get a clearer picture of where we stand today. Let’s close on a positive in our farm fields. Check out this story about prairie strips---beautiful and beneficial. "Hidden in Midwestern Cornfields, Tiny Edens Bloom."