There is optimism regarding winter crop planting and production because of recent rains across the Australian grains belt, according to ABARE’s June issue of the Australian crop report.”Rainfall in late May and early June was timely for those winter crops that had already been sown and provided an opportunity for remaining planting intentions to be realised,” Phillip Glyde, Executive Director of ABARE, said upon releasing the report. The area sown to winter crops in Australia is... ...Read more »

Sustainable practices in agriculture, combined with the development of local food systems, can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the food system, finds a new paper by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) in the US. The paper, “Identifying our Climate ‘Foodprint’,” by Jennifer Edwards, Jim Kleinschmit and Heather Schoonover, looks at the entire food chain and identifies opportunities to shift toward a more climate-friendly system. The paper concludes... ...Read more »

The National Farmers Union (NFU) of the UK has endorsed the main findings of a major report released by the influential think tank, Chatham House, which suggested a need for companies to be better prepared for volatility in global food markets. The report ‘Food Futures: rethinking UK strategy‘ examines the critical challenges facing UK food production in a world of rising food demand and increasing pressure on resources and the environment. It points out weaknesses in UK food supply including... ...Read more »

The European Parliament has called for “immediate and continuous action” to ensure global food security. It believes the aid of €1 billion that the EU has decided to give to developing countries should be accompanied by fresh investment in agriculture and it calls for mechanisms to be set up to ensure that sufficient global food stocks are available. In the space of two years, world food prices have increased by over 80% on average while cereal stocks have fallen in 2008 to a worrying... ...Read more »