ABSTRACT
The problems of hunger and malnutrition remain a major concern for many millions of people worldwide, despite the evident success of our attempts to expand the productivity of the global food production system and enhance its ability to provide sufficient food as the global population expands and diets change in response to increased prosperity. Another puzzling aspect of the current global food and nutrition problem is simultaneous undernutrition and overconsumption, starvation and obesity, often in the same country and even in the same city. In addition, there is increasing evidence that significant amounts of edible food are being wasted by wholesalers, retailers and especially by households. Yet this triple dilemma of hunger in the face of adequate production, coincident starvation and obesity and ever-increasing food waste is an oversimplification of the complex interactions that underpin our food production and consumption activities. As we suggested in the introductory chapter, this book is an attempt to explore these complex relationships from an economics perspective.
