Farmers Guardian
By Alistair Driver

How can politicians, the agri-food industry and NGOs solve global agriculture’s sustainability problem? The Forum for the Future of Agriculture went ahead in Brussels on March 22, despite the shocking attacks on the city.  FFA 2016 discussed the balance between food production and the environment.

The global agriculture model needs to be reformed to find a better balance between food production and environmental management, an international conference has heard.

The ninth Forum for the Future of Agriculture (FFA) in Brussels went ahead in a somber mood on Tuesday following the shocking events that had unfolded in the city that morning. But the key conference message remained undimmed – global leaders and the food industry had failed to fully comprehend the long-term problems the current agricultural model was storing up and coordinated global action and leadership was required to address them.

British farming newspaper, The Farmers Guardian reported that recurrent themes emerged as the conference debated how to strike the right balance between food production and environmental sustainability. These included:

  • Smarter, more efficient use of nutrients, including through technological development in the laboratory and wider use of precision farming;
  • Reducing the unacceptable level of food waste at farm, processing and consumer level, including finding outlets for food unwanted in its intended market;
  • There was also much debate around the role consumers could play when it comes to the volume, nutritional value and nature of what they eat, including the balance between meat and plant-based food – and what could be done to alter buying habits when price is often king;
  • Another major theme was leadership and the willingness, or otherwise, of political leaders, the food chain and NGOs to accept the scale of the problem and to work collaboratively together to address it. This included calls for a common framework or ’road map’ for all to work to.