AGRICULTURAL SUSTAINABILITY AND FOOD SECURITY: AN

INTEGRATION NECESSARY FOR THE FUTURE

ILSI ANNUAL Meeting 2014

Pedro Antonio Arraes Pereira Advisor to the Secretariat of Strategic Affairs of the Presidency of Brazil

Marilia R. Nutti Researcher, Embrapa Food Technology

OUTLINE

1. Introduction A. Enviroment complexity B. Food demand C. Knowledge/Trends

2. Sustainable Food Production A. Conservation agriculture B. Sustainable intensification C. Agrobiodiversity

3. Biofortification 4. Key Research Areas

HISTORICALLY

Maximizing the nutrient output of farming system for a culturally acceptable and balanced diet has never been the objective of agriculture.

Rather the objective has been to maximize production while mimimising costs

Different Problems different solutions

FOOD QUANTITY AND FOOD QUALITY

10 / 15%

10 / 15%

4% 26%

26%

40% 17%

The expected increase in world food production by 2020 is 20%. The higher expected increase in food production will be in Brazil. Expected 40% in the period

Map of undernourished population ( % total population)

% of increase in production

(OECD, 06.15.2010) Elaboration: Fiesp-Deagro

Brazil Became Food Secure Country in a Short Period of Time

Source: Martha Jr., data from Dieese (2010)

TRENDS ON FOOD PRICE

Fiesp, 2013

Natural resources must be seen as the basis for a revolution in the

frontier of science…

… as well as a unique opportunity to build harmony between development and environmental conservation and

nutrition security.

Sustainable Food Production

Soil Fertility and Quality •Complex Chemical, Physical and Biological Process •Soil degradation Water requirements •Direct effect on food production. •Water pollution - high inputs of fertilizers/ pesticides.

Cultivated area under no-tillage systems around the world (1000 ha)

Source: Brazilian Federation of No-Till cropping system – FEBRAPDP, 2006

Cultivated area under no-tillage systems in Brazil – over 25 million ha

Sources: Brazilian Federation of No-Till cropping system – FEBRAPDP; Martha Jr., 2010

Source: MAPA, 2010 – Photo by APDC

Technologies Adapted to Small Scale Farming Systems

Sustainable Intensification

•Use of the same area with different crops •Integration - agriculture /animal production/ Forest

Source: MAPA, 2010 – Photos by Votorantin Metais

“Agricultural intensification and expansion with mitigation of environmental impact”

Source: Embrapa Cerrados

Intensification of land use with integrated crop-livestock-forest

systems

Target: 70 million ha of degraded pastures - the new agricultural frontier

Combination of 90+ different

technologies

Pasture restoration

Restoration of degraded pastures

Pasture degradation

Source: http://www.climaeagricultura.org.br/index.html

Define suitable areas for each agriculture

activity based on criteria of sustainability

Sustainable Food Production •Agrobiodiversity •Role of agrobiodiversity in improving dietary quality and dietary diversity

New Approaches for designing genotypes in non optimal conditions associated with

anticipated environments

•Precise phenotyping •Fertilizer use •Other tolerance to abiotic constraints •Designing genotypes for specific nutritional attributes

Biofortification

To develop biofortified crops and evaluate their acceptability by target group.

To breed for high pro - vitamin A varieties of pumpkin, sweet potato, cassava and maize.

To breed for high Fe and Zn contents cultivars/ varieties of rice, beans, cowpea beans , maize and wheat.

To develop food products and packing that are in accordance with the target group eating and dietary habits.

To evaluate the potential of the utilization of the biofortified food in the school lunch program of Maranhão, Sergipe and Minas Gerais States ;

To develop communication , diffusion and technology transfer actions in order to guarantee visibility for the project among the stake holders

BioFORT Project Objectives

THE BREEDING TARGETS FOR LAC REGION

Fe Bean: + 44 ppm Fe Rice: + 6 ppm Zn Bean: + 17 ppm Zn Rice: + 12 ppm pVAC Maize: +15 ppm pVAC Cassava: +15 ppm pVAC OFSP: +75 ppm

- AgroSalud Sh

ort

term

Improved varieties

drying

extrusion

bakery

Nutritional Quality Products

Med

ium

– lo

ng

term

Fe Zn Beans

BetaCarotene Cassava

Beta-carotene Sweetpotato

Fe Zn Rice

QPM Maize

Other crops

Fast track approach

•Beans – 3 cultivars •Cowpea – 3 cultivars •Cassava – 3 cultivars •Sweet-potato – 1 cultivar •Maize – 1 cultivar (2013) •11 cultivars launched.

30 Demonstration Units

20 Field Days

http://www.biofort.com.br

http://biofortblog.blogspot.com Publications and presentations of

the meetings available

Videos available

First Embrapa Project which developed a website with Blog, Facebook and Twitter, in order to interact with the social networks.

Key Areas of Reasearch

Post-Harvest and Storage

• Harvesting and storage technologies that preserve the content and quality of target compound

Production Systems

•Food characterization especially from tropical regions aiming at the identification of food stocks rich on target compounds •Management practices which favour production target compound and decrease antinutritional and allergenic factors

Omic’s Science

• Food improvement which has content and quality traits associated with target compounds. • Genes discovery and expression from plants ,animals, and microorganism associated to health effects.

Pre-breeding and breeding programs

• Genetic improvement to develop materials containing traits with positive effect on nutrition and health. • Characterization of genetic resources to identify sources of minerals, vitamins, bioactive compounds, proteins and fibers.

Processing

•Development of strategies for food biofortification •Development of processes and specific products which promote content and quality of target compounds

In vivo studies of nutrition and health and in vitro nutritional impact

•Development and methods application to evaluate bioaccessibility/bioavailability on in vitro of target compounds. •Pre clinical and clinical evaluations for measuring nutrition benefits and functional properties of food on health

Socio economic studies

•Evaluation of social and economic impacts for deficiencies of mineral, vitamins, proteins

•Economic viability of production and commercialization of ingredients and products of prebiotics, probiotics, vitamins, minerals, proteins, and biotive compounds for food industry

Market studies on food consumers preferences for food and nutritional

education

•Market studies for differentiated ingredients and products on nutritional and functional quality for food industry and consumers •Nutritional information on benefits and risk to health

- Improvement of efficiency of Breeding Programs and biotechnological approach to develop better sources of food

- Integration of agronomical Science with food ScienceScience

- Loss reductions using residues and co-products for food uses.

- Enhancement of relationship between food chains inside the farm and at agroindustry.

-Enhancement of strategies for increasing the population awareness for consumption of food with better nutritional and

functional effects on health.

- Contribution to prevention of cronic non transmittible diseases Contribution to reduction of spending on public health programs

-Better quality of life

Thank you! pedro.arraes@presidencia.gov.br