Conclusion Preventing Catastrophe

Abstract

Every catastrophe triggers an onslaught of destruction. And each time, the world wonders what could have been done in order to avoid or limit the damage. Indeed, famines and food shortages have marked the course of human history, but things took a turn in the twentieth century, when the planet was finally producing enough food to feed humanity, despite it being more populated than ever. A stream of alarmist analyses (inspired by Malthus) began to emerge, citing our inability to feed the world, but they have thus far proved false. Hunger is now mainly tied to problems of access to and distribution of food. The current causes of hunger are crisis, war, inequality and poverty. Throughout this book, we have explained the context of the issue and found that if care is not taken, the world’s nutritional situation could once again be catastrophic in the twenty-first century. Ensuring food security remains a major challenge. Three foreseeable processes may well converge to cause a catastrophe. First, the population of the planet is at an all-time high, which in turn will lead to rapidly growing agricultural demand. Second is the environment. “Nature”, which is now very dependent upon and shaped by human practices, must be managed as a system and collective good with limited resources and as a precious inheritance to be conserved for future generations, even though fossil energy sources are becoming increasingly rare. Third, climate change will heighten uncertainty and lead to critical situations because of the unfortunate convergence of extreme events, such as droughts, flooding or fires.