ABSTRACT
In 2001, the ‘Challenges of a Changing Earth: Global Change’ Open Science Conference resulted in the Amsterdam Declaration, which stated that the participants ‘recognise that, in addition to the threat of significant climate change, there is growing concern over the ever-increasing human modification of other aspects of the global environment and the consequent implications for human well-being. Basic goods and services supplied by the planetary life support system, such as food, water, clean air and an environment conducive to human health, are being affected increasingly by global change’, and ‘a new system of global environmental science is required’. As a consequence, the four signatories to the Declaration, the global change programmes sponsored by the International Council for Science (ICSU), DIVERSITAS, IGBP, IHDP and WCRP, agreed to form the Earth System Science Partnership (ESSP) to, through scientific research, elucidate how significant components of the life support system of Planet Earth will be affected by global environmental change (GEC) processes. The ESSP established a few key projects integrating the best natural and social science competencies of its parent organizations to address issues of GEC and human well-being. Thus, projects were developed to consider water, human health, carbon and food. Results from the food project, Global Environmental Change and Food Systems (GECAFS), complemented by results from many other food security-related projects, are reported in this book.
