Resilience in Food Systems

Summary

Food production, processing and consumption are interconnected all over the world, forming a highly complex “food system”. This system should provide sufficient food to a growing global population, no matter how much the climate changes, or how scarce resources become. It should also avoid causing environmental and social damage. Changes in the food system are urgently required, in order to improve its outcomes for food security, and environmental and social welfare. Decision-makers need to be able to estimate where and how they can make the necessary changes, without making things worse elsewhere. They also need to know if such changes will allow the system to carry on functioning even if there are disturbances (such as big climate changes). This requires the development of new tools, which can capture the complexity of the system, and evaluate its resilience to disturbances.

"Enhancing Resilience in Food Systems" is a Flagship Project of the Word Food System Center with ETH. All the details are on a specific website.