GECO - Sustainability virtual italian fair
For thousands of years, humanity has sustained itself by expanding. As the population grew, the share of land devoted to crops and livestock was increased, mostly by clearing forests and woodlands. After farming practically all the available land, our civilisation realised that the subsistence of life on the planet depended largely on maintaining natural ecosystems that were not compatible with agriculture. Instead of farming more land, we therefore started experimenting with techniques and tools to increase crop yields. Now the climate emergency is causing us to change our strategy once again: we need high output levels, but we also need techniques that do not deplete the soil, that do not generate unsustainable emissions, that do not waste water and that do not damage ecosystems with harmful pesticides. This means that it is time for a new technological revolution in the agri-food sector. This is what the current scenario looks like.
/media/ckeditor/1643203546_1.jpg
How can we promote technological innovations that make the agri-food sector sustainable for both the human population and the planet? Many technologies are emerging from different scientific fields that could help us with that. They range from genetics to digital technologies, from agroecological and technological innovations to those involving optimised planning and green policies. The current technological landscape is full of possibilities, but also rich in challenges. The key to creating a functional system is understanding the complexity and interdependence of all the stakeholders in this industry: everyone needs to be pulling together. Farmers, breeders, business owners, innovators, researchers, governments and even consumers: none of us can afford to ignore the fact that our food needs to come from more sustainable sources.
Climate change and declining biodiversity threaten the viability of the agri-food industry. The solutions are individually known: protect ecosystems, avoid the extinction of existing species, ensure food security, avoid soil depletion, use sustainable farming and breeding methods, power production with renewable energy instead of fossil fuels, shift to a circular economy whenever possible. Putting these directives into practice on a systemic level, however, is much more difficult than focusing on individual points. The use of biomass produced from livestock and agricultural waste as fuel is a perfect example of how such a process can be initiated: disposal costs for producers are transformed into income from the sale of waste products, which makes it possible to invest in new technologies and sustainable energy systems.
Planning is at the heart of all the most significant technological innovations in this field. Thanks to the digitalisation of analytic tools, it is possible to maintain the necessary level of production while drastically reducing water and electricity consumption and, consequently, emissions and waste. The aforementioned use of biomass also makes it possible to make energy consumption circular. Of course, it is also essential to ensure the social sustainability of the entire industry, offering local communities the opportunity to profit from the success of sustainable enterprises and ensuring that the digitisation of agribusiness translates into fair and equitable management of resources, eliminating the exploitative practices currently associated with intensive farming and agriculture.
Interested in sustainable food issues? Come to the next edition of GECO Expo and discover our Ecofood thematic area!
Published on 26-01-2022
