The Fate Of Food In The Developing World: An Interview With Amanda Little

In her book, The Fate of Food: What We’ll Eat in A Bigger, Hotter, Smarter World, Amanda Little travels the world to tell the stories of the food workers, agriculturalists and innovators that are responding to the challenges posed by rapid population growth and environmental change.

The Fate of Food

Amanda Little

“The narrative that we’re running out of food is as old as civilization,” she explains. “But the stakes have never been higher nor the risks greater. Climate change has been a real game-changer, ushering in an era of uncertainty and chaos, heightening the need for both old traditions and new technology to redefine sustainability on a grand scale.”

‘Trying to get control over food production in the climate change era is incredibly difficult,” she continues. “It is throwing systems, ecosystems and certainly agricultural systems so many curve balls.”

This has especially been the case for nations that are disproportionately affected by impacts such as extreme weather, flooding, droughts and sea-level rise. Scarce financial resources and limited access to technology further heighten this vulnerability.

The relevance of Little’s reporting at this critical juncture in world history needs to be underscored. We are at the cusp of a massive overhaul of global food systems— never before has technology been manipulated to such a great extent, essentially reengineering food production as we know it.

I interview Amanda Little to make some sense of the future. Together we discuss the outlook of food systems for the world’s most vulnerable people.

Daphne Ewing-Chow: In your book you mention, “the nations with the least reliable Food Supplies generally have the least diverse economies and the most vulnerable governments.” This really speaks to the unique issues facing the developing world, especially in the context of climate change.

Amanda Little: Yes. Reliable food supply confers political power; inversely, unreliable food supply can lead to political vulnerability. Many of the nations that have existing instability in food production are also on the front lines of climate change impacts, such as serious flooding, soil salinization and erosion—in other words, they’re doubly vulnerable. They also face challenges of infrastructure and distribution. The US Department of Agriculture has done some really interesting analyses on climate change impacts on food systems and they concluded that one of the biggest risks for import-dependent nations is the breakdown of distribution lines— road systems, shipping, ports, trains, fuel supplies and so forth.

In my research I looked at what happens when food systems collapse entirely— if a country is heavily reliant on food imports and a storm hits, its farms are hurt and its ports shut down and, the paralyzed food supply puts those populations at great risk.

Daphne Ewing-Chow: How can developing countries begin to prepare now for crises such as these?

Amanda Little: We need to support and enhance local food networks as much as possible. And for import-reliant developing countries, it may come down to bolstering emergency response strategies.

Daphne Ewing-Chow: With all of the debilitating impacts of climate change, many agriculture-reliant developing countries are beginning to explore the use of GMO seeds to produce strains of crops that are more robust. In your book, you suggest that GMOs may have an important role to play in this context. Can you elaborate?

Amanda Little: What I've learned about GMOs, which I didn't understand going into my research, is that they can have both negative, even dangerous applications and possibly also environmentally beneficial applications.

Humans have been manipulating plant genomes for 10,000 years— since the beginning of agriculture, to create bigger yields and tastier crops. The most prevalent application of GMO technology so far has been to design plants that can tolerate more agrochemicals, which has led to a lot of concerns about the overuse of the herbicide, glyphosate and the resulting human health and environmental impacts. There are good reasons to be concerned about this application of GMOs, but it doesn’t mean that all GMOs are inherently bad. Just as you can design a plant to tolerate herbicides, we may also be able to genetically modify plants with characteristics that build climate resilience and enhance the robustness of food systems. As we face increasingly volatile growing conditions around the world, farmers need to be nimble. We need to be able to respond to new problems and adapt quickly and new breeding technologies may speed up our response time. We can also draw on the wisdom of agroecology—smaller, more diverse farms that mimic natural systems, to build resilient food systems, but we may also need very prudent and carefully controlled applications of high-tech breeding methods like CRISPER and GMOs.

GMO research of cereals. Testing of genetically modified seeds.

Getty

Daphne Ewing-Chow: Your book had an optimistic outlook for the 9.7 billion people that will walk the planet by 2050. Does this degree of optimism also hold for the developing world where there are so many economic, environmental and infrastructural challenges?

Amanda Little: That is the single most important question to ask and the hardest one to answer.

Over my five-year investigative adventure, I met agriculturists who are using modern breeding tools to create nutritious heirloom crops that can withstand drought and heat. I met activists who are trying to find ways to eliminate food waste and scientists who are developing robots that can weed without herbicides, and sustainable fish farms that don’t produce pollution. I’ve met farmers who are using drones and soil sensors to grow crops with increasing precision. They can grow leafy greens and berries with up to 90% less water— and most importantly, these technologies often draw on the wisdom of traditional agriculture. They're reviving ancient, nutrient-dense plants. They're finding ways to recycle water. They're developing micro-irrigation systems and local, sustainable proteins. Many of these techniques and technologies can help produce high-nutrient foods with far fewer inputs and in ways that are better for the soil and the planet.

The people who will help build sustainable food systems in the future are the farmers, the scientists, the engineers, the activists and those who aren’t afraid to ask tough questions about the problems we face and the kinds of solutions we need to put in place. I'm also optimistic because I find more and more people who want to join this conversation and wake the world up to the problems at hand.

Daphne Ewing-Chow: Which questions are yet to be answered?

Amanda Little: We have a lot of solutions that hold promise but the most important and challenging question to answer is— how can these solutions become available to not just wealthy nations, but also to the most environmentally and economically vulnerable populations?

Also, we have to stop talking either-or – should we go the route of agroecology or technology? It must be both. We need to explore every tool available that can help us find our way through the tough century ahead.

We need to explore the best technologies of our time while respecting and preserving traditional and indigenous food production methods. Building resilient food systems will require the preservation of local food webs and local food production, protecting small farmers and providing them with technology where it can be most useful and applied in the best way.

Currently, it's very wealthy countries that are beginning to make substantial investments in intelligent and robotic precision-farming equipment, vertical farms, plant-based meats and cellular agriculture, implementing smart water networks and developing ways to recycle sewage and desalinate water on a large scale. The question is, which of these technologies hold the most promise, and how quickly will the cost come down? How accessible and available will they become? How do we make sure that the food that we’re producing is better for humans and better for the environment but also affordable for everyone? We need to ensure that food can be produced in a way that’s not just climate-resilient, but also equitable and affordable.

Long-term sustainability in food production is critical from both an environmental and a social justice perspective. This is a moral imperative.

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