Published today (Mon 9th March 2015) in Independent Science News:
Will Food Sovereignty Starve the Poor and Punish the Planet?
by Gilles Billen, Luis Lassaletta and Josette Garnier
Summary: There exists a forceful global people's movement which has begun to positively assert the rights of small producers and individual consumers over the food system. This food sovereignty movement presents an explicit challenge to the corporate domination of food and agriculture found in many areas of the globe.
The practicality of food sovereignty has nevertheless been challenged by various economists who believe that long distance trade is crucial to environmental sustainability and for cheap food. These economists allege that food sovereignty will "starve the poor". Using modelling approaches that focus on nitrogen flows in the global food system, and also case studies from Europe, the authors of this article summarise a series of papers they have authored in which conclude that regional and local food sovereignty should enhance sustainability and not decrease it. One can think globally and eat locally!
The authors are at UPMC (University Pierre and Marie Curie)/CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research), Paris, France.
Yours sincerely,
Jonathan