ABSTRACT
Over the past half-century, rapid economic and population growth have culminated in a global food system dominated by industrial agriculture and giant multinational corporations, and based on cheap oil and water. Make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate is the core message of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development or UNCTADs path-breaking Trade and Development Review, Wake up before it is too late. In spite of official complacency, the food bubble generated by industrial agriculture and soil and water mining is unsustainable. Deforestation to expand the cultivated area is a major driver of global warming, which in turn will exacerbate existing problems of declining water resources and progressive erosion, though the precise path of change cannot be predicted exactly. As the global climate continues to change, already fragile ecosystems around the world, with their growing animal and human populations, will similarly become ever more vulnerable to ecological collapse.
