Feeding the world is a noble goal, especially when one in eight people go hungry every day.
Food Banks of Canada reports a lower level of hunger in this country, but the numbers are rising. Nationally and worldwide, levels of hunger are a growing concern.
In the face of these numbers, an easily conceived remedy is to increase agri-food production and drive more commodities and food through the system.
However, several reports highlighting food security do not refer to such a simplistic solution. Instead, they talk about the need for better government policies surrounding food supply.
Read Also
Sask. ag group wants strychnine back
The Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan has written to the federal government asking for emergency use of strychnine to control gophers
A Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) report says 40 percent of the food in the United States is wasted.
And although it would be easy to blame our over-consumptive American neighbours for their wastefulness, it appears that we Canadians are equally as guilty of excessive waste.
The NRDC report, Oxfam and Food Banks of Canada all refer to the need for better domestic and foreign policy that is broader than simply increasing production.
The North American food waste numbers should cast an embarrassing shadow over our individual food consumption practices, but the real power in the numbers is the perspective that they allow us to develop.
Such a perspective could be used to better position Canadian agri-food production as a global leader and desired brand.
So rather than blindly increasing production, I hope the discussion and resulting policy that drives provincial and national direction will include an evaluation not only of the potential to produce more in a changing environment but also the potential to better manage what we produce, distribute and consume.
Developing a better understanding of the entire picture of food security rather than simply attributing hunger to a lack of agricultural production is crucial to becoming a global food security leader.
The recent announcement of $37.2 million for the Global Institute for Food Security (GIFS) at the University of Saskatchewan may enhance the ability to use Canadian innovation for global change.
The new funding is directed toward innovative genomic re-search to position Canada as a world leader in digital and computational agriculture.
However, the ability to produce more in challenging conditions is only one part of the solution.
The great opportunity that this funding provides, should the GIFS choose to recognize it, is the potential to use Canadian innovation as a lever to improve the larger policy, both nationally and globally.
Leadership directed toward that magnitude of change will definitely serve to increase GIFS’s record as a contributor of solutions to the global challenge of food security. It’s a record that Canadians can be proud of.
