1. Introduction

In Chapter I, the evolution of national food systems and of the global food system were described. It showed the evolution of the structure and operation of food systems: from an initial situation where primary agricultural production was the central and dominant component, to the current situation, with a global food system composed of diverse productive and commercial links, including multiple economic players throughout the world. This set of processes and players comprises the subsystem responsible for the production and supply of food.

On the other hand, consumers, choosing food based on autonomous decisions and behaviors, compose the subsystem responsible for demand, as analyzed in Chapter II.

The arguments developed in Chapters I and II make evident four important themes:

1. Human nutrition is provided by and depends on a complex global food system where many private players intervene under a normative framework defined by the public sector. Primary crop-livestock production is a minor component in terms of its contribution to the global food system’s GDP. For example, in the USA, the value of primary food production represents only around 15% of food expenditure by consumers. The remaining 85% is associated to processing, transport, logistics and trade activities. ^[1]
2. In spite of its decreasing relative importance, agricultural production continues to be an essential and central link for the whole global food system. Agricultural production uses resources (land, water, biological) that are scarce at a global level. Therefore, the food system must use them efficiently to feed the world population at reasonable prices. That is to say, the global food system must be at the service of global consumers, who determine, through their consumption decisions, what products must be produced and what quality and nutritional attributes they must have.
3. The global food system is composed of a broad set of national food systems, closely related, in the first place, through international trade. International trade has an important role, as over 20% of the food consumed in the world comes from imports. On the other hand, Latin America, especially the MERCOSUR countries, has become the main net food exporter in the world. They contribute almost 40% of net food exports, being the main food suppliers for the rest of the world, particularly those countries and regions with food deficits.
4. However, the interrelations between countries through the global food system are not limited to traded goods. The global impact of food production and trade has, at least, other three dimensions: a) environmental sustainability, especially in terms of the global warming produced by greenhouse effect gases (GEG) emissions, water pollution, etc.; b) the potential international transmission of animal and human diseases; and c) the nutritional impact of exported foods, affecting all the countries who intervene in international trade. These global interrelationships and interdependences between food production and consumption suggest the importance and need for an efficient global food system that meets the expectations of the world population. Therefore, humankind has the huge challenge of achieving, through collective actions, a global food system that may develop harmoniously and comply with a set of conditions directly related to the five dimensions/attributes described below.

2. The global food system in perspective

2.1. The national food systems and their participation in the global food system: inter-relationships and trade-offs

The global food system is composed of various national food systems that are mainly interlinked through trade, but also through other economic, biological and environmental relationships.

These national food systems are different from each other and have evolved according to each country’s stock of natural resources and cultural and economic history. Each of these national systems include a set of 5 dimensions/attributes that define: a) their productive features, including productivity and efficiency, b) their relationship with the environment and the natural resources, c) the quality and safeness of the food produced, d) the nutritional attributes of the food produced, and e) their economic and social sustainability.

From a global and regulatory perspective, although the global food system comprises the national food systems, it should respond to the demands and needs of global consumers in a balanced manner. This primary objective may entail contradictions and trade-offs with the particular objectives of each country. Consequently, negotiations and agreements are required to carry out global policies focused on the wellbeing of humanity as a whole.

2.2. The five dimensions/attributes that define the quality of the global food system

The development of food systems, both national and global, should mainly aim at achieving a food system that balances the five main dimensions/attributes. These five attributes are described as follows^[2]:

The first attribute is the capacity to produce the quantity and variety of foods necessary to satisfy the global demand at reasonable and time-stable prices.

As stated in Chapter I, achieving food safety and eradicating hunger in the world have been central concerns of humanity throughout history. Such concerns have directed public policies and investments — both within countries and in multilateral organizations — to agricultural and food production. The Green Revolution implemented since the 70’s, mainly based on the research carried out by the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research, CGIAR, was a result of these concerns and represented a core instrument to increase production and ensure food security at a global level.

The success of this process was, from a productive perspective, fundamental, allowing for very significant increases in agricultural productivity and food production. The future challenge is how to sustain and increase food production efficiently, using the scarce natural resources available in the world, to meet the growing global demand. The search for global efficiency requires a comprehensive utilization of the available resources, concentrating production in the most fertile agro-ecological regions of the world.

A second necessary attribute is that food production must be environmentally sustainable and not contribute to global warming.

The impact of agriculture on the deterioration of natural resources (mainly water, agricultural land, forestry, wetlands and other fragile habitats) is a consequence of the intensification of production and the insufficient use of conservationist practices. Even if the impact is essentially local, regional and, to a lesser extent, global interrelationships are also affected.

In the 90’s, the evidence on global warming introduced a new dimension to the concerns related to the impact of food production on Greenhouse Effect Gases (GEG) emission, highlighting the strong global interrelationship in environmental matters.

The contribution of agriculture to GEG emissions has received different interpretations. Estimations vary according to how carbon fixation by pastures used in livestock production are considered, and to the marked agricultural differences depending on agronomic practices. Two additional elements to consider are deforestation as a negative element and reforestation as a practice significantly contributing to carbon fixation.

A third attribute of the food system is related to food safeness, zoonosis in particular, and its potential relationship with human health. This concern has been present for a long time, especially associated to certain animal diseases that may affect human health, such as brucellosis or spongiform encephalopathy (“mad cow disease”), which are cases of special importance.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed urgency to this dimension and to the alleged link between the global food system — the trade component, in particular — and the spread of diseases transmissible to human beings.

The fourth attribute is related to the composition and nutritional quality of food and its potential relationship with human health. FAO and other public and private organizations have called attention to the growth of certain human diseases, such as obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular deficiencies, that are strongly related to consumption of processed foods, these habits having greatly increased with urbanization and economic development.

An example of this was the intensive discussion during the G20/T20/B20 summit held in Buenos Aires, in 2018, where the private sector (B20) presented an important document committing to improve this attribute through diverse actions, including the correct labelling of foods.^[3]

Finally, a fifth dimension/attribute is the economic and social sustainability of food production. This means that economic agents should receive a sufficient retribution so that they may be able, and wish, to remain in the productive process.

Therefore, a balanced development of the global food system must consider these five dimensions/attributes which represent the core of the current discussions and proposals in different forums, particularly the Food Systems Summit organized by the United Nations.

A core point to take into account is that when there are multiple objectives, as with the five dimensions/attributes, there are also trade-offs among them. Such trade-offs exist both within national food systems and between the national systems and the global food system.

Two simple examples illustrate the dilemma: 1) as regards national systems, in terms environmental sustainability, it would be convenient to totally remove herbicides and most chemical fertilizers. But that would result in a significant reduction of productivity, thus affecting food security and prices in each country; and 2) as regards the global food system, the same situation obtains. If the largest producing and exporting countries adopt conservationist practices without adequately attending to productivity and efficiency levels, the global available production will be reduced and the net importing countries will have difficulties to meet their import requirements at reasonable prices, increasing their food insecurity.

Therefore, the main question is to achieve an adequate development of all food systems, including the global food system, integrating each of the five dimensions/attributes and keeping the appropriate balance between them. This balance will vary in different eco-systems and in different countries, and how each country develops its balance will affect, mainly but not uniquely through trade, the global balance.

This global interdependence, along with and the necessity to achieve an adequate balance for humanity’s current and future needs, suggests how important it is for countries to work coordinately and for multilateral organizations to adopt it as a priority mandate.

In the following sections, each of the five dimensions/attributes will be analyzed showing their relative importance, their quantitative dimensions, and the potential actions and public policies needed to steer the development of the global food system in an appropriate direction.

3. Ensuring a quantitatively sufficient food supply to eliminate hunger in the world

3.1. The needs/demand for food at a global level

The global food system must be able to adequately nurture the world. That is to say, it must be able to provide food in a sufficient amount, at reasonable prices that remain stable in time, and with the variety and quality needed to satisfy consumer expectations.

The first constraint to satisfactorily meet this objective is the limited amount of agricultural natural resources which constitute the basis for raw material production. Therefore, the efficient and sustainable use of natural resources must be a core component in the construction of a global food system. This will require a sustained effort in terms of investments and public policies to meet the expected increases in the global food demand.

Recent FAO estimations suggest that food demand will expand by 60% by year 2050. To respond to this demand, it would be necessary to increase production by about 1.6% per year. This estimate is corroborated by projections made by OECD/FAO, which indicate that food demand will increase by an annual 1.5% until the year 2030. ^[4]

These figures are mainly an estimation of the additional demand that will emerge due to population growth and the consumption increase derived from a higher purchasing power. However, in order to have a full picture of the productive difficulties and the pressure that will be exercised on agricultural natural resources, it is necessary to consider two additional impacts: a) the consumption derived from the elimination of current food insecurity situations, and b) the qualitative changes in the population’s consumption habits. These qualitative changes will occur due to income improvements and to diet changes required to preserve human health.

The objective of eliminating global food insecurity in the next 10 years — the scheduled time to reevaluate the SDGs’ compliance — will mean a significant additional increase in total consumption.

Food safety was defined thus in the food security summit held by FAO, in 1996: “Food security exists when all persons have physical, social and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meet their daily energetic needs and alimentary preferences to lead an active and healthy life at all times.”

As we can see, the definition expressly refers not only to the quantity of food but also to other conditions and attributes that the global food system must resolve. It specifically mentions access to food, an increasingly urban problem related to the income and economic capacity of consumers.

In this sense, it is important to point out that, in the last two decades, most countries’ efforts to eliminate hunger through social policies resulted in a rapid reduction of global food insecurity measured in terms of consumed calories. Significantly less people have endured food insecurity each year. In 2017, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the United Nations estimated that the number of individuals suffering from hunger was about 820 million. ^[5]

This success, though significant, is still insufficient, especially after the situation worsened in 2020 owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, which is estimated to have increased the number of people with food insecurity to 1.020 million^[6]. Therefore, eliminating in 10 years the food insecurity that still prevails among so many people will require an important additional effort of a global nature.

Food insecurity is associated to different phenomena. The most important is poverty, which is concentrated in two specific geographic areas: a) the suburbs of big cities, widely spread in Latin America, and b) rural territories overpopulated in terms of existing natural resources which, due to their distance to urban areas, lack non-agrarian job alternatives.

Eliminating this structural food insecurity will require economic changes leading to a better access to food by the poor population. But it will also require a substantial increase in food production and/or reduction of post-harvest losses to face the additional needs estimated by FAO and OECD/FAO projections. If the objective were to achieve, by year 2030, a satisfactory nutrition level — at least in caloric terms — for the almost one billion underfed people, it would be necessary to increase food supply by about 0,5 % annually during the next 10 years.^[7]

These estimations suggest that the annual increase of total food consumption, measured in calories, should be of about 2.1% until year 2030: 1.6% to cover the estimated increases of demand plus 0,5% to eliminate current food insecurity. This is a very important figure that, as shown below, will be quite hard to reach.

Additionally, we must consider the impact of necessary changes in the composition of consumers’ food demand due to cultural changes. These changes will be concentrated on a higher demand of fresh fruits and vegetables, mainly in high-income countries, and of animal proteins, especially in Asian countries, as a result of their important increases in per capita income.

These products in higher demand are more difficult and expensive to produce, requiring a larger utilization of natural resources per product unit (measured in calories). Therefore, these changes in consumption will result in a stronger pressure on natural agricultural resources, especially land and water.

On the other hand, as mentioned before, there is also food insecurity of a nutritional nature. That is to say, there are people who are unable to complete healthy diets, including sufficient essential amino-acids, vitamins and minerals, for a normal development and a good health. Figure 3.1 shows the importance of some types of current nutritional deficiencies. Resolving these dietary deficiencies will require larger intakes of animal proteins, vegetables and fruits, which, in general, have a higher price per unit of product. This analysis suggests the enormous productive effort that will be necessary to supply sufficient, nutritionally adequate food and ensure a world without hunger by year 2030.

3.2. The necessary productive transformations to eliminate hunger in the world by 2030

Succeeding in the difficult objective of eliminating hunger in the world will require a qualitative leap in the organization and functioning of the global food system. An increase in food production of about 2.1% per year — in a context of little to nil expansion of the cultivated area and of increased consumption of vegetables, fruits and animal proteins, which make extensive use of natural resources, especially water — will require important changes in the economic policy and substantial increases in investments and the intensity of technological innovation.

In regards to the economic policy, it is necessary to achieve an adequate macro-economic stability and a favorable economic and productive context for food production. To such end, economic policy should contemplate adequate prices and enough incentives for the whole food productive chain, so that production may increase efficiently and sustainably in each country, especially the largest food producers at a global level. Each country and each particular situation will needed a different economic policy; the latter must address all the productive sectors comprising the food systems.

An additional core element is the implementation of large investment programs in logistics, infrastructure and telecommunications, especially related to food systems, allowing for the modernization of food production and distribution. Special consideration should be paid to those investments directed at reducing post-harvest losses and broadening the activities involved in bio-economy, including the concept of circular economy.

The importance of innovation as a core element to increase primary production and productivity is a widely recognized fact. During the 2010-2020 period, the annual global increase of crop and livestock production in Latin America was of 2% and 2.5% respectively. ^[8] Should this significant production growth continue in the future, it would be almost sufficient to achieve consumption increases compatible with the elimination of hunger at a global level for 2030. However, such production increases, achieved in most world regions, were a consequence of two factors: a) the expansion of the productive area, partly due to the incorporation of forest areas for crop and animal production; and b) the increase of productivity per hectare.

It is evident that, in the current context, where concerns about the preservation of natural resources and environmental sustainability have taken a new dimension, a further expansion of cultivated land is essentially impossible, except for some relatively limited spaces still available in Latin America and Africa.

Consequently, the necessary increase in food production of 2.1%, estimated above, must come almost exclusively from an enhanced total productivity of the production factors, particularly from land, which is the scarcest.

Recent studies, such as CERES 2030, have identified a significant number of technologies that allow a sustainable increase of food production, highlighting the incentives that have effectively achieved a rapid adoption of the most appropriate technologies in each particular situation. ^[9] These and other studies are essential in providing the knowledge needed to attain an intensive and sustainable use of natural resources.

Alternatively, other studies point out the limitations of productive systems based on agro-ecology or agronomic practices focused on the protection of natural resources but without considering their productivity. In the absence of high productivity and production, the objectives of effectively eliminating rural poverty or appropriately feeding the world cannot be met.

A new element that could contribute to a better food supply is the recent developments, conducted mainly in the USA, to produce animal proteins and generic foods from vegetable products. Although these scientific achievements could be important for food production, new questions arise as regards their impact on GEG emissions and the use of power.

This highlights that, in current food systems, primary food production is not the only source available to the end consumer. Food supply also depends on the development of a processing industrial system and a complex distribution and marketing system that offers food to largely urban consumers. These links in the productive chain, representing about 85% of food expenditures by consumers, must also be efficiently developed to respond to the rapid expansion of consumption.

3.3. The importance of reducing food losses

An important instrument to increase the current food supply at the disposal of end consumers is reducing food losses throughout the productive process. The estimations about the quantitative magnitude of these losses are variable and have not been carefully documented. However, FAO estimates indicate that, in Latin America, they fluctuate between 20 and 50% of production for the different food categories ^[10] (see Figure 3.2).

3.4. International trade to respond to geographic imbalances between national consumption and production

Food insecurity and the objective of eliminating hunger in the world by year 2030 is relevant in all regions — all the more in developing regions from Africa, Asia and the Middle East —, and trade has an important role to play in fulfilling this objective.

This is so because food consumption and food production have a very unequal geographic distribution. While demand/consumption is concentrated in countries with large populations and growing per capita incomes, mainly in Asia, production is concentrated in regions which are well endowed with agricultural natural resources. Consequently, the current and future capacities to produce food sustainably, at reasonable costs and in quantities exceeding their own population’s needs is concentrated in a few regions of the world, including the Western Hemisphere, Europe, Eastern Europe and Oceania. That is to say, regions where food demand is lower than their capacity to produce it.

This imbalance between the need for food and the capacity to produce it — a phenomenon that has increased notably during the last two decades — results in some countries being forced to import food to meet their own needs. Figure 3.3 shows that the need to import food is concentrated in African and some Asian countries.

This situation results in international food trade being an important compensation mechanism to achieve a certain level of food safety in all regions of the world. Such international trade requires, and has been governed by, a set of multilateral regulations and trade agreements that contribute to the free mobility of food.

On the other hand, these geographic imbalances are also present within the Western Hemisphere, the main net food exporting region. Figure 3.4 shows that Latin America and the Caribbean include regions that are highly dependent on food imports, while others, mainly MERCOSUR, are net food exporters.

These arguments show the importance of trade as an instrument to eliminate hunger in the world. However, three important challenges have emerged during the last decade which need to be addressed.

The first challenge refers to the implications of intra-firm trade. Figure 3.5 shows the growing importance of trade within the global value chains, including intra-firm trade. The latter establishes particular business rules parallel to the existent multilateral rules and facilitates the utilization of private standards that could represent an additional restriction to food trade.

A second challenge is the weakening of multilateralism in general and of the World Trade Organization (WTO) as the body in charge of safeguarding it.

Finally, there is the growing importance and pertinence of new requirements and/or standards, linked to environmental sustainability parameters, food safety regulations and desirable nutritional aspects or attributes of food. These standards will potentially impose changes in the organization of production, adding significant difficulties for exporting countries and, in particular, for small- and medium-sized food-producing companies. These aspects will be developed in the following sections, pointing out the nature of the issue, how the newly adopted trade standards have developed, and the possible policies and actions that will be necessary to produce and distribute food globally.

These challenges must be considered to ensure that the international trading system continues to contribute to an efficient food flow, from the regions and countries with surpluses to those that depend on imports to achieve food security at reasonable prices. It is important to emphasize that food imports represent over 20% of global food consumption. ^[11]

International trade is governed by multilateral rules agreed within the scope of the WTO and is framed in a broad number of regional and bilateral agreements. Progress, in terms of trade liberalization achieved after the Uruguay Round and especially with the creation of the WTO, has been considerably less significant in regards to agriculture, where there are still important restrictions to trade. Achieving an efficient food system requires both a wider liberalization of agricultural trade and the reduction of costs related to transport and logistics.

4. Ensuring environmental sustainability ^[12]

A dimension/attribute of food systems that is receiving special attention by the international community is environmental sustainability. This includes the concerns about food production’s role in global warming and the conservation of natural resources, such as water, soil and biological diversity. These legitimate and important issues are receiving great attention both at a national and international level, especially since the signing of the Paris Agreement. The challenge is understanding the strong interrelation between environmental sustainability and the other four necessary attributes in food production, particularly production capacity at a global level.

This understanding is necessary to devise concrete actions and meet the targets of reducing emissions and protecting agricultural natural resources, without affecting food production capacity at a global level.

4.1. Food production in the context of global warming and its CO2 capturing potential

Climate change brings about unprecedented challenges for the global society. There is a common understanding — elaborated within several international instruments such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) (1992), the Kyoto Protocol (1997-2005), and the Paris Agreement (2015) — that the world temperature increase must be kept, during this century, under 2°C with respect to pre-industrial levels, and that efforts should continue to further limit it to 1.5°C.

The proposed joint action seeks to achieve the maximum point of GEG emissions as soon as possible. With this purpose in mind, both the private and public sectors in developed and emerging countries are involved in the Race to Zero for 2050, proposed by the United Nations. The focus of these actions is to implement an efficient environmental management, tending to minimize direct and indirect emissions and to compensate through CO2 sinks, in order to decarbonize anthropogenic activities on the planet and reach a balance that allows economic development without extreme effects on the climate.

Like every anthropogenic activity, food production systems impact on the local and global environment in different ways. They use approximately 50% of the planet’s inhabitable land^[13] and represent 19-29% of global GEG emissions, of which 80-86% come from agriculture and livestock production^[14]. According to OECD-FAO data, it is estimated that in the 2019-2028 period, assuming there are no changes in current technology use and public policies, direct GHG emissions from agriculture, forestry and other land uses will increase by 0.5% per year^[15]. It is important to point out that different productive systems and products have different environmental impacts; therefore, it is necessary to start approaching food environmental sustainability by analyzing the lifecycle of individual products adjusted by local practices. Particularly in regard to primary production, direct emissions (mainly nitrogen and methane) and indirect emissions (carbon emissions due to change in soil use) should be adjusted by the carbon sequestration (in foliage, roots and soil) that agricultural activities may generate. The resultant net emissions are very important information in the path towards carbon-neutrality. The analysis of food systems’ net emissions should include emissions by related activities, including processing of raw materials, packaging, transportation, cooling, retail, restaurant and domestic consumption, and, finally, under the concept of circular economy, waste and reuse or final disposals (cradle to cradle).

Consequently, even though primary activities concentrate a high percentage of the food system’s total emissions, they are also part of the solution to the climate change problem through efficient carbon absorption. This concept of carbon absorption is contemplated in the definition of Climate-Smart agriculture, which combines agricultural productivity and income increase with adaptation and generation of resiliency to climate change, along with mitigation and absorption of GEGs emissions. Although there is currently no potential inventory of the food systems’ global carbon absorption, FAO estimates suggest that the amount of carbon fixed in crop soils, as organic material coming from cultivation and manure, can be increased by 50% if better management procedures are introduced.

Similarly, emission produced by grazing activities can be absorbed if trees are planted in the same areas. A lower rate of deforestation, together with regeneration and planting of trees, could significantly reduce carbon dioxide emission.

4.2. Carbon leakage through food trade

At a multilateral level, the Paris Agreement demands all parties to do everything in their power through their contributions at the national level and to periodically report on their emissions and implementation efforts, which should always represent a progress. Developed countries should continue to exercise their leadership by setting absolute reduction goals for all the economy, whereas emerging countries should continue to intensify their mitigation efforts. The latter are likewise encouraged to advance towards achieving the goal of reducing emissions in the economy, in light of their different national circumstances.

The Paris Agreement proposes elaborating a global inventory every five years from 2023 on, in order to assess collective progress towards reaching the agreement’s goals. At the same time, the UN publishes a Gas Emission Report which presents the latest information about disparity between the emission levels estimated for 2030 and the levels required to comply with the temperature goals set forth in the Paris Agreement. The 2019 report specifically estimates the emissions associated with exports and imports and provides a better perspective of the impact of consumption and trade. This analysis shows that the net carbon incorporated through trade flows from Third World to First World countries. Therefore, even when First World countries reduce emissions in their own territories, the incorporated carbon in their import activities partly offsets their mitigation efforts. This is translated into per capita emissions in demanding markets being higher than in exporting countries. These carbon leakages through imports, mainly from countries with more lax regulations, are starting to be corrected by the destination countries through environmental cross-border regulations. Such regulations seek to ensure equal treatment for locally produced and imported products, either through environmental taxes or new emission threshold requirements, thus discouraging environmentally inefficient trade.

4.3. Other environmental impact categories and their mitigation potential

Within the multiple public and private environmental standards in force, the highest impact of this type of certifications and/or environmental statements is on food. There are currently different calculation methods for various categories of potential environmental impact based on the life-cycle analysis. Carbon balance is just one of them. Other categories of environmental impact that revolve around food production are, among others, water footprint, loss of biodiversity, deforestation, depletion of organic carbon in the soil, direct and indirect change of soil use, eco toxicity, presence of particulate matter in the air, acidification, and eutrophication^[16].

According to the Living Planet 2020^[17] Report, food production is also responsible for 29% of global greenhouse effect gas emissions, 80% of deforestation, 70% of fresh water use, 50% of water biodiversity loss, 70% of land biodiversity loss, and 52% of soil degradation. At the same time, agricultural systems have a huge potential to mitigate all those negative aspects, not only through the equivalent carbon sequestration, but also by providing habitats to animal species and creating vegetation corridors. It has been broadly documented that sound environmental management is also crucial for a better food production, with the protection of pollinators as a good example of this.

The occupation of marginal land for agricultural production is the main cause of deforestation, forest fragmentation, and loss of forest biodiversity. As mentioned in the State of the World’s Forests 2020 Report^[18], large-scale commercial agriculture (mainly beef cattle breeding and soybean and palm oil cultivation) was the cause of 40% of tropical forest deforestation between 2000 and 2010, while local subsistence agriculture was the cause of another 33%. Ironically, the resiliency of human food systems and their capacity to adapt to future changes depend on that same biodiversity; therefore, a close interdependence between them is more present than ever.

Water is an essential resource for life and only 2.5% of the water available on planet Earth is fresh water; out of this fresh water, 68.1% is ice, 30.1% is ground water and only 1.2% is superficial water.^[19]

As to global use, domestic consumption takes 11% of fresh water, industry takes 19% and agriculture the remaining 70%. As an example of the use of water in agricultural production, it can be pointed out that global livestock production requires 2422 Gm3 of water per year. One third of this volume is for beef production and cattle breeding, 19% for dairy products, another 19% for pig production, and the rest for other types of animals. Of the total volume, 98% refers to water consumption for the production of animal food, and the remaining 2% is used to hydrate animals and for service waters^[20]. Here lies the importance of an efficient management of the water resource in the food chain. In particular, the efficiency of the water footprint is not only measured in regard to consumption, but also with respect to the resource’s availability in the specific place and at the specific moment. When the water footprint is combined with all production in a geographic location during a specific period of time, it is possible to measure if such production has crossed the sustainability threshold and whether it is sustainable or not. At the same time, virtual water contained in food flows through trade to destination countries. Some exporting countries are starting to limit the production of items that are intensive in virtual water so as to reduce their impact on total water consumption. On the other hand, countries with scarcity of fresh water (40% of the world population is currently affected by the scarcity of fresh, clean, safe water) can supply their population with food containing virtual water through trade. The efficiency of the water resource, then, has an important meaning in environmentally sustainable development, linked to Sustainable Development Goal 6.

After the oceans, soil constitutes the second largest natural carbon sink, exceeding the capacity of forests and other vegetation to capture carbon dioxide from the air. Given that soil is a non-renewable resource, shifting its use for anthropogenic activities brings along different consequences, such as acidification due to pH reduction, salinization, nutrient imbalances (deficiency and excess), contamination, loss of soil biodiversity, or loss of organic carbon. Therefore, it is necessary once again to conduct a sustainable management of soil through agricultural and livestock activities.

In this respect, the following activities are encouraged by the Global Soil Partnership: crop rotation with nitrogen fixers; sustainable management of fertilizers and chemical pesticides; conservation tillage and non-tillage or zero tillage system; and enlarging and maintaining a protective organic cover on the surface, using cover crops and stubbles. Regarding the loss of organic carbon in the soil, which is one of the main hindrances for soils to function as carbon sinks, the FAO estimates that global stocks of carbon comprise 450-650 Gt in vegetation and 640- 2.344 Gt in the soil, which is two to three times more carbon than in the atmosphere. Consequently, agriculture and livestock farming should have as main objectives avoiding carbon release from soils and sequestering more carbon where possible. This is a major proposal of the 4×1000^[21] initiative launched by France in 2015. In order to encourage these soil re-carbonization practices, carbon credit markets in the primary stage of the food chain could be an interesting instrument.

In conclusion, ensuring the environmental sustainability attribute of food systems is justified not only by its intrinsic capacity to mitigate climate change at a global level, but also by the possibility to build environmentally sustainable food systems without sacrificing the productive capacity and/or international trade activities needed to attain global food security.

5. Building food systems that protect human health ^[22]

Food safety has been a central concern both for consumers and governments. Foods can be transmitters of domestic animal diseases, which has economic consequences (foot and mouth disease), and of others that might affect human health. These health risks have resulted in regulations and control systems which are very important in the productive and commercial areas. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has generated a new and intense concern and fear about the potential role of food trade in the spreading of human diseases; such fears could affect the global food system’s structure and functioning.

On the other hand, food can also be contaminated with active residual chemical products that might affect human health. This has resulted in regulations based on scientifically set limits which constitute an important component of commercial agreements and affect the structuring of food systems.

5.1. Food safety as an essential attribute

As it is concluded in the UN 2030 Agenda, all the people are entitled to a sufficient and nutritious diet to foster their personal development. In this sense, food is essential for the promotion of health and the eradication of hunger, which in the current context requires that food be supplied beyond national borders. Unfortunately, to this date, the OMS estimates that 600 million people, approximately 1 out of 10 in the world, get sick every year after eating contaminated food. Out of these, 420,000 people die, including 125,000 children under the age of five^[23]. Young children suffer 40% of food-transmitted diseases, which constitutes a strong and direct impact on population curves, since they represent only 9% of the population. In addition, food is known to cause over 200 acute and chronic diseases — from digestive tract infections to cancer — of an infectious or toxic nature, whether caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites, or chemical substances.

Consequently, to function properly, the world food system requires a key attribute: global food safety. There is no food safety without product safety, and any adverse incident related to food safety can negatively affect countries, exhausting their healthcare systems^[24] and damaging their national economies, trade and international reputations. Recent WHO and FAO estimates indicate that unsafe food causes annual productivity losses by around USD 95 billion in low- and middle-income economies.^[25] At the same time, poor food safety produces food losses and waste of natural resources.

To reach a good level of food safety, it is necessary to acknowledge that food is more vulnerable than any other basic product, since it can be affected by: 1) contaminants unintentionally added during production, packaging, transportation or storage processes, or even coming from the environment; 2) microorganisms resistant to antimicrobials, as a consequence of antimicrobial misuse in animals and vegetables^[26]; and 3) contamination due to pesticide residues from livestock farming or products used in primary industrial processes.

Therefore, to ensure that consumers’ food is safely produced, commercialized and consumed, special attention should be paid to those food risks that cannot be perceived through sight, smell or taste. Safety is a shared responsibility.

5.2. Regulatory harmonization, and management and communication of risk assessments at the international level as key conditions for food system resiliency

National food systems, globally interconnected through trade, require a coordinated international management to ensure global food safety. The expansion of agricultural trade has increased the availability and affordability of food; but at the same time, it has increased the possibility for non-safe or unhealthy food produced in one country to affect the health of consumers in another country.

This is where the Codex Alimentarius performs a key task. Representing more than 99% of world population, the Codex collects food regulations (191), guidelines (76) and codes of practices, —permanently evolving thanks to the contributions of scientific experts and member countries —, bringing them under a common understanding of what food safety means. It would be impossible to imagine international food trade without regulations. Thanks to this standardized environment, taken as an impartial point of reference, consumers can trust the safety, quality and authenticity of food.

At the same time, as it is acknowledged in the General Guidelines of Codex, these regulations must promote a global harmonization to facilitate free trade. If every government applies different food standards, trade becomes more costly and it would be very difficult to ensure that food is safe and meets consumers’ expectations. Hence, by harmonizing standards, trade becomes less costly and more inclusive. The WTO’s Agreements on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPA) and on the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), along withtheir notifications systems, prevent them from becoming barriers to trade.

In addition, the Codex suggests applying an approach based on the Hazards Analysis and Critical Control Points System (HACCP) to improve food safety, as well as to encourage the application of risk analysis. In this regard, FAO, WHO and the Codex Alimentarius Commission have made significant progress in the preparation of a systematic framework to apply the principles and guidelines of risk analysis to food safety. This framework is based on the functional division between risk assessment and risk management as a guarantee of scientific integrity and independence. The last step in the process is the communication of risks.

The outbreaks of trans-border diseases have increased in the least years, placing food safety at risk. In order to tackle this challenge, the setting of the Food Chain Crisis Management Framework (FCC) by FAO has been very important. It is an approach that combines prevention, preparation and response to food chain emergencies.

To achieve this, it is necessary to invest in and strengthen the development of national capacities to proactively control food. When a country attends to these needs, its participation in the food regulation system and trade becomes proactive, its contributions relevant, and the results, reachable.

Many factors within and outside from food production systems could lead, either directly or indirectly, to the appearance of hazards, risks and problems for food safety. The outbreak of COVID-19 has shown the need to implement a change that had been taking place in the last years: moving from a “reaction and response” to a “prediction and prevention” approach, which enables the early identification and prevention of possible emerging problems. Exploration and prospective methodologies and approaches have been widely used in different sectors for many years; more recently, their application to food safety has allowed to identify potential hazards and mid- and long-term opportunities. In this way, it will be possible to build a more resilient world food system, capable of preventing outbreaks and supplying safe food during global crises.

5.3. The “One Health” approach: food safety and environmental sustainability

Food production has to accompany the projected demographic growth. It is estimated that the global population in 2050 will be approximately 10 billion people. At the same time, the increase of income produces a higher demand for animal products. In a world with more people and animals, the outbreaks of diseases may spread faster than in the past, even more so considering the greater interconnection through trade. Some diseases affect only animals or human beings, but certain animal diseases also place risks for humans, and new diseases of this type keep appearing regularly. Recent estimates suggest that, out of the 1415 pathogenic agents that affect human beings, 61% are of zoonotic origin.

This situation entails a problem for disease surveillance, besides the fact that outbreaks can have devastating effects on local production and trade. In this way, food safety is closely related to the environment around us and to food-producing organisms. Currently, 60% of contagious diseases come from animals, and of these, about 75% come from wild animals^[27]. The appearance of these diseases is correlated to a high human population density and a great wildlife diversity. Furthermore, it is driven by anthropogenic changes such as deforestation and the expansion of agricultural activities, the intensification of livestock farming and the increase of wildlife use. In accordance with this interconnected reality, FAO, OIE and WHO have adopted the “One Health” holistic approach, a framework of common collaboration to deal with human, animal and environmental health issues. This initiative promotes the exchange of information and capacities among the health, agriculture and livestock farming, veterinarian, environmental and food safety sectors in order to support the prevention, early alert and mitigation of situations that may jeopardize such approach and have an impact on trans-border trade. The goal is to prevent a new pandemic, and this is where the safety attribute of food systems interrelates with the environmental sustainability attribute.

5.4. Traceability as a response to consumer demand

Consumers are increasingly aware of food safety issues, as well as of the need to be selective with the food they buy from supermarkets and stores. They expect their governments to adopt legislative and regulatory measures to ensure that only safe foods, both local and imported, are sold and that health risks are minimized. That is why keeping consumers informed about the life cycle of food, from the field to the table, turns traceability into one of the main management tools in food safety matters.

This traceability demand has been strengthened due to COVID-19, and there is greater awareness in regard to sanitation and its role in the transmission of diseases. A doubt has been raised as to whether food can contribute to the transmission of the virus that causes COVID-19. Since, to this date, there is no scientific evidence to prove it, an additional question has been raised regarding the possible transmission through the surfaces of packages and containers. Consequently, world food production and distribution activities have been paying more attention to informing their intermediate and end consumers about the implementation of protocols to reduce transmission risks through physical contact with packages and containers used in trade activities.

The fact is that coronaviruses cannot multiply in food; rather, they need a human or animal host to reproduce themselves. Even though it is virtually impossible for a person to contract COVID-19 through food or packaging, food chains have had to work on traceability from primary production to the shelf, and even to the table, in order to avoid penalties from consumers.

All of this shows that governments, both individually and collectively at a global level, must ensure: a) that agricultural and food producers adopt good practices to ensure a sufficient supply of safe food, b) that operators of food companies, from processing to retail, guarantee compliance with food safety programs, and c) that consumers exercise their right to a safe nutrition through an informed purchase. In other words, food safety is a shared responsibility that becomes a fundamental requirement of national and global food systems.

6. The nutritional dimension/atribute in food systems

The main issues related to consumption guidelines and nutritional problems have been identified, described and characterized in Chapter II. This section is focused on describing the existing links between the nutritional aspects and economic conditions faced by consumers, and the set of policy instruments available to address the problems involved.

As argued in Chapter II, the national or cultural diets, that is to say, the most extended diets in each country and/or cultural group, developed based on the most abundant and available food in the territories where these social groups flourished. A classic example of this is the importance of beef in the countries surrounding the Rio de la Plata in South America, roots and tubers in some African regions, or corn in Mexico and Meso-America. These diets, though highly dependent on a single product, or on a small number of products, were, however, sufficiently varied and nutritious to allow the development of these societies.

This observation shows that, to the extent that food consumption is closely related to primary production, and as long as consumers’ economic situation guarantees their access to food, the adaptability of human beings allows them to survive and thrive on diets including very different combinations of products, in spite of them not being greatly varied.

In our current world, these conditions are not always present. On the one hand, highly-spread poverty hinders access to food in sufficient amount and quality for many consumers. On the other hand, the emergence of complex food systems, inherent of our times, has progressively developed a wide marketing, processing and distribution chain between primary production and end consumption, distancing consumers from agricultural producers and radically modifying the way in which primary products are ultimately consumed. This has resulted in an important percentage of people in the world not having access to healthy diets (see Figure 3.6).

Such diets may be unhealthy mainly because they lack essential amino-acids, vitamins and minerals largely provided by animal proteins and fresh vegetables and fruits. These have, in general, a high market price and are therefore difficult to access for low-income, especially urban, consumers.

Hence, the existence of a considerable number of individuals that do not consume nutritionally well-balanced diets is explained by three main reasons:

1. The first and probably most significant, in quantitative terms, is related to the fact that many families lack the sufficient income to afford nutritionally proper diets.
2. A second cause is insufficient education on the nutritional value of diets and the importance of consuming proper diets for good health. This is particularly important as regards highly palatable industrialized products which are easy to acquire and consume but may lack quality attributes.
3. Finally, a third cause is connected with the relatively high unitary cost of the food products with the highest dietetic value, in particular animal proteins, fruits and vegetables.

Consequently, the solution to the existence of unhealthy diets is strongly linked to two economic issues: a) the total number of low-income social groups in each country, and b) macroeconomic policies, particularly income support and food subsidies implemented by governments.

In addition to the economic policies and food subsidies that improve the poor consumers’ capacity to access food, it is essential to work on the efficiency and productivity of the food system, so as to make nutritionally proper diets more affordable and available to poor consumers.

Consequently, there are three main lines of action which are extensively used in many countries but should be strengthened at a global level. First, achieving higher productivity and production of these nutritionally necessary foods, including higher efficiency in their distribution and marketing, both at the national and global levels, so as to reduce their price and improve access for consumers. Second, introducing genetic modifications in mass consumption crops to improve their nutritional value. An example of this is the golden rice developed by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), with a higher content of vitamin A. These works should be accompanied by an intense information and education campaign, based on scientific evidence, to reduce consumer reluctance and increase their consumption. And third, spreading and fostering home vegetable gardens in rural and peri-urban areas, and even in fully urban zones. There are many successful experiences on this topic, both in Argentina and in other Latin American countries, that have been documented by FAO^[28].

In addition, it is necessary to improve consumer education and information, an issue developed in Chapter II. A key instrument to expand consumer information and facilitate the identification of nutritional attributes in processed foods is labeling programs.

In the past decades, a significant proportion of foods — especially cereals and oilseeds, which are the basic components of the diets of a wide majority of consumers, especially urban ones — are consumed after complex industrial processes. This industrial elaboration offers new products with organoleptic and nutritional features that are quite different from those of the primary products used in their preparation. These processed foods have, in a large number of cases, a higher concentration of carbohydrates, especially sugar, fats and/or salt, making them very attractive to consumers but potentially harmful for their health. This problem is illustrated by the increasing presence of nutrition-related diseases, such as obesity, diabetes, gluten intolerance and food allergies, which have raised concerns about their relationship with food patterns. Obesity and diabetes, two diseases with high morbidity, have evidently expanded in recent years.

Recent estimations suggest that diabetes affects almost 10% of the global population, while more than 30% of the global population (and this percentage is growing) is significantly overweight ^[29] (see Figure 3.1).

The main social response to these food-related pandemics has been campaigning to improve consumer information about the nutritional attributes of processed foods. This seems to be the main instrument to achieve a better nutrition of the population in general and should be a priority for all governments.

An important element of providing the sufficient information on certain nutritional attributes of processed foods is that consumers may take the best decisions at the time of purchasing or consuming them. For this to be possible, governments must implement necessary regulations that are useful for consumers, while counting with a reasonable level of acceptance from the food processing private sector.

An enormously successful example are the labelling rules that require indicating whether the food contains gluten (wheat, rye and barley) or is gluten-free, so as to alert gluten-intolerant consumers. This labelling has also allowed and encouraged the development of certain products that, in time, have garnered great acceptance from consumers.

A specific policy that is spreading more slowly is the mandatory labelling of all processed foods to indicate their content of sugar and fats. Even if a significant number of countries have legislated on this issue, imposing certain labelling obligations on food processing companies, this initiative has found reluctance on the part of the private sector based on two main arguments. The first is that labelling rules have been approved independently in each country and, therefore, have not been unified. This situation represents, especially for small- and medium-sized companies, a non-tariff barrier, since it requires a specific packaging and, hence, an additional cost for each of the countries to which products are exported. The second reason is certain discrepancies on the information that is to be provided and the specific manner to do so.

This discussion suggests that the labelling system to be implemented should result from an international agreement defining a unique system at a global level. This would facilitate its implementation on the part of the companies, enabling them to produce and export processed foods without having to adapt the labelling to each country’s particular regulations.

The document prepared by the B20 for the G20 meeting, held in Buenos Aires in 2017, presented a modern and forward-looking view on the topic, suggesting the willingness of the private sector to advance on a global policy on nutritional labelling ^[30].

Within the framework of the existing global institutionalism, the Codex Alimentarius managed by FAO could undertake the responsibility for leading this process. This points out the need to create more effective and politically powerful mechanisms to drive a global labelling policy and devise additional actions that could contribute to a better consumer information.

It is worth asking whether these two actions – consumer information and a global policy to regulate and implement nutritional labelling – would be sufficient to achieve a better nutrition at a global level. It is hard to know! However, these two steps are necessary and potentially useful, and they would outline a path for other supplementary policies to emerge.

7. Economic and social sustainability

The economic and social sustainability of food systems is a concept that has no accurate and widely accepted definition in technical writings. The following definition will be used here: “The economic and social sustainability of a productive system is associated with the principle that the economic agents who take part in it should receive a retribution sufficient to guarantee both an appropriate compensation for those factors of production involved in the productive process and a personal retribution, or company profit, that justifies their permanence in the activity”^[31].

In a stylized (even utopic) description of a market economy, the amounts of goods and services produced and their market prices are determined by supply and demand, which in turn determine the retribution to economic agents as well as production factors. This is the mechanism that determines, through competition, the capacity of economic agents to stay in the activity. This supposes the existence of competitive markets with symmetrical and complete information, access to productive and technological resources and other type of necessary conditions for all economic agents to face comparable situations in regards to market competition. In the real world, these conditions are not fully present in most cases, and this has led to different forms of state intervention aimed at correcting the existing imbalances and complementing market operations. This is particularly true in agricultural production, which has specific characteristics and more rigidities and imbalances than other sectors in the economy. In particular, in agricultural production there are very significative externalities, both positive and negative. A poignant example of positive externality is the role of agriculture in the preservation of rural landscapes and national cultures. Meanwhile, the potential negative consequences of the degradation of natural resources and the impact of CO2 emissions on global warming exemplify negative externalities.

These issues have been widely discussed in academic writings and also in many official documents where objectives and policies for agricultural production are defined. In general, it is recognized that in agriculture: a) producers face imperfect markets, both for products and in relation to access to land and other inputs necessary for production; and b) that both positive and negative externalities require specific state interventions to promote desired economic and political objectives.

Moreover, in many countries, especially developing ones, there is an important number of agricultural producers that lack the technological conditions and/or economic dimension needed to organize efficient productive processes. Small economic dimension linked to distant markets, the lack of communication infrastructure, the imperfection of land markets and other inputs, insufficient access to credit and many other factors: all of these make it especially difficult to compete in the market with other productive units that are better positioned geographically and economically. These competitive disadvantages are even greater in the international market, where such producers must compete with the agricultural production of other countries with better or more abundant agricultural natural resources and a national economic organization that defines a more favorable environment for agricultural production.

These particular conditions have led agriculture to receive governmental support in the majority of countries through tariff protection, price support policies and subsidies directly aimed at the producer, and the provision of public goods.

A paradigmatic example of ample domestic support policies for agriculture, in the case of developed countries, is the PAC of the European Union, which has remained — with some changes — in the Farm to Fork proposal recently approved, but is also present in other OECD countries (see Figure 3.8).

These policies expressly establish that one of the objectives is to ensure an adequate retribution for agricultural producers. Another example is the agrarian policy in Japan, which includes very high tariff protection mechanisms and huge direct subsidies to agriculture to allow for the subsistence of producers who are not competitive at the international level.

These policies also exist in many developing countries which, in many cases, have a narrower objective focalized in economically sustaining small producers representing an important proportion of the population, both rural and national, that are not internationally competitive. This situation is especially relevant in some Asian countries, such as India or Bangladesh, where small agricultural producers and the rural population in general represent a very high percentage of the total population. Hence, although agricultural activities provide insufficient income to producers, the lack of opportunities in other sectors of the economy makes it necessary for them to remain in the countryside, both from a personal standpoint and from that of society and the government as a whole. These structural conditions justify the important support policies for agriculture implemented in such countries. However, in a long-term approach, this situation should be viewed as a structural problem that must be gradually solved through a more diversified and inclusive economic development.

In Latin America, these extreme situations are found in just a few countries and in particular situations. Yet, as it can be seen in Figure 3.9, almost all countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have agriculture support policies, some of them being quite significant.

Thus, as can be seen in Figures 3.8 and 3.9, domestic support policies are quite generalized around the world and their implementation is justified by a combination of the following three development objectives:

1. Supporting small scale farmers with little systemic competitiveness. This justification is widely used in developing countries;
2. Making up for the positive externalities of agriculture that are not compensated by the market (conservation of culture and landscape, protection of natural resources, etc.), which is one of the traditional arguments used by the EU to subsidize their agriculture; and
3. Protecting national producers from international competitors whose productions are characterized by negative externalities with global effects which are not included in the price of agricultural commodities. This is the main argument put forward by the EU in the Farm to Fork to set a border price on productions that are not carbon neutral.

In Latin America, support programs for small producers have used tariff protection measures and direct price support mechanisms as the main instruments. The empirical evidence indicates that support prices benefit each individual producer in proportion to their production and, therefore, they are more significant for large-scale commercial agriculture (see Figure 3.10).

Therefore, price support policies (subsidies) to agriculture, which have been mainly justified to support small producers, have not met such objective for three main reasons. First, because the price support policies used have benefited production and agricultural producers regardless of their size or productive and economic conditions or of the positive and negative externalities of their productive systems. Second, because the different types of small producers have not been clearly defined or identified. Even if there are many who have feasible and reasonably productive farms that could be developed and become viable agricultural enterprises with appropriate public policies, there are many others who, due to their productive conditions, cannot take advantage of the support they receive. A farmer with an insufficient amout of land and lacking in access to information, strategic inputs and the market cannot take advantage of the price subsidies or other commercial support mechanisms.

These farmers, many of which are rural inhabitants with some subsistence agricultural activities and generate income in other non-agricultural activities, require support through direct cash transfers and appropriate provision of public welfare, such as education and health, just like urban inhabitants.

Another negative consequence of applying these price support policies to agriculture is that they have contributed to preserve less productive agricultures, while delaying technological innovation and hindering agricultural trade liberalization at a global level. From a national perspective, they have hampered the efficient use of scarce agricultural natural resources and the increase of agricultural production and productivity Consequently, this has resulted in lower production and higher food prices at the national and global levels.

Food production inefficiencies at a national level have also had negative impacts at a global level. World consumers pay higher prices for food than what they would pay if all countries, and therefore the global food system, worked under more competitive rules and kept higher efficiency and productivity standards. In a certain way, it can be said that tariff protection mechanisms and price subsidies have resulted in global consumers, the majority of which are urban and poor, subsidize the rural poor and, in many cases, agricultural production in general.

This analysis is not a negative value judgement in regards to widespread agricultural policies. The macroeconomic and population conditions in many countries, like India, for example, probably make it impossible to modify the current situation in the short run. It simply points out and emphasizes that the agrarian policies implemented in many countries constitute an issue deserving deep consideration because of their negative impact on global food production and international food prices.

From a global perspective, the development of the global food system should have as its main objective nurturing a growing world population in a sustainable manner and at reasonable prices. With this in mind, public policies should be focused on building a global food system that uses the scarce natural agricultural resources with the utmost efficiency and productivity, while paying sufficient attention to the attributes of environmental sustainability and health and nutritional attributes, as developed in prior sections. This view, which is included in the SDGs, suggests that developed countries should collaborate with the developing countries to adapt their national food systems to achieve efficient and sustainable production systems worldwide.

At a national level, when productive conditions make it necessary, the response to rural poverty issues should be focused on social welfare policies, appropriate access to public services and developing capacities for alternative employment. These policies are of a national scope and would not affect either the international food prices or the amounts produced and offered at a global level. In this manner, rural poverty which is a national problem, could be resolved through national policies without affecting the global food system.

8. Some general conclusions

In previous sections, it has been proposed that a core challenge ahead is to develop a global food system that includes the five necessary dimensions/attributes in a simultaneous and balanced manner, in order to harmonize, within each national food system and at the global level, the trade-offs between such dimensions/attributes.

The possible discrepancies in regards to the conformation of the global food system arise from the importance that each person or stakeholder assigns to each of the five dimensions/attributes. Some will emphasize food security, others, environmental sustainability, and so on. It is also true that assigning an exaggerated or exclusive importance to any of the attributes may result in a unfeasible global food system that does not meet the objectives contemplated in the UN Development Goals. This would have very negative consequences for humanity.

The future development of the global food system will depend on the proper understanding of the problem by society as a whole and on the organization of the necessary political and negotiation processes. The observations and proposals made in this document aim at contributing to a better understanding of the topics inherent to an efficient and balanced global food system.

On the other hand, political negotiations and the definition and implementation of the policies needed to develop an effective and balanced food system will require institutional mechanisms that promote and facilitate such negotiations, both at the national and multilateral levels. These issues will be considered in chapters IV and V, respectively.