Some 795 million people worldwide are food insecure: they do not have enough food to lead a healthy life, and with the earth’s population increasing these numbers are about to rise even higher. By 2050, the world needs to produce at least 50% more food in order to feed its growing population. What can we do to fight hunger and malnutrition?
Throughout history hunger and malnutrition have been an issue, especially in development countries and areas of military conflict. And even though we are nowadays in possession of highly developed mediums of transportation and communication we do not seem to be able to tackle these problems.
Due to climate change (getting worse year by year), long periods of drought, floods and tropical storms are on the increase – there are tremendous consequences for those already living under difficult circumstances.
Only if we make use the modern technologies that we have, we will be able to fight this global crisis. A recent initiative encourages governments to give open access to their data to support farmers worldwide in making good, evidence-based decisions on these and other data such as weather forecasts, satellite images and information exchange with other farmers worldwide.
The ‘the more – the better’ strategy many large companies in the food and agriculture sector followed is slowly but surely replaced by a more sustainable, environment-friendly approach: An overall shift in the mentality towards long-term investment for sustainable businesses is noticeable.
In recent years, a growing number of agriculture executives have taken up on the concept of sustainable and organic fertilizing, which has an important effect on the earth’s soil and therefor the yield. Organic fertilizers improve the mineral content of the soil, prevent erosion and increase the size, nutrition and speed of growths of the crops.
The international agriculture company Ferm O Feed has a range of organic and biological fertilizer that are exported to more than 60 countries all over the world. Initiatives such as the ‘2Scale Project‘ that was realized in cooperation with IFDC in Benin or the story of the farmer Mr.Truc from Vietnam who increased his yield by 50% show how organic fertilizers can have a very positive effect not only on the soil but also on the people’s lives.
