ABSTRACT
We are suffering from a chronic productivist fantasy. The thinking behind it goes as follows: since there will be x billion more people on planet Earth, we will need x billion more tonnes of food. This is an outdated view. 80% of the research in developed world countries is still mostly ignoring the phenomenon of accelerated climate change. It is simultaneously ignoring the fact that we can’t go on using nitrogen-based and mined phosphorus as our principal source of nutrients and it is mostly ignoring what is happening to our soils – not least because of the excessive use of artificial fertilizers and chemicals – and totally ignoring energy balances. At the heart of many of today’s sustainability dilemmas is the questions of how many heads (or stomachs in this case!) we have to accommodate the needs of, on this finite planet.
The really important story here is to think about opportunities for people who understand the world as it really is. And in that story, business has got a really important role to play. It is interesting to see that most of the big retailers are developing some increasingly smart and focused ideas about recalibrating the whole protein story for their consumers.
