Food
The Third Biennial Championing Public Health Nutrition 2012
Centre for Science in the Public Interest - cspinet.org
2012 Conference
The Third Biennial Championing Public Health Nutrition
October 29-30, 2012 at the University of Toronto's Hart House
7 Hart House Circle, Toronto, Canada
Health and food-policy experts, key policy-makers, journalists, and health advocates from across Canada and around the world will explore how to reform public health nutrition policies. The conference will convene at the University of Toronto's Hart House Great Hall, steps away from the Ontario Legislature.
Program
Global Food Supply - We Need to Plan for System Failure
ethicalcorp.com - by Mallen Baker - October 4, 2012
Mallen Baker argues that it’s irresponsible not to make contingency plans, especially when the potential failures concern the fundamentals – such as food
Imagine your critical business systems depend on one computer server. This server is huge – it has immense capacity – but you have grown into that space and now every single day you are pushing it to its limit. . .
. . . Now let’s substitute the global food system for the server. Here we have a system that is operating at full capacity. Any hiccups in normal production can lead to serious problems. This year we have seen such hiccups.
ISO Focus+ - From Fish to Forests - May 2010
submitted by Albert Gomez
iso.org - May 2010
The use of fish and wood products continues to grow and are fast becoming the world's most traded commodities in their respective fields. At the same time, both sectors, crucial to biodiversity, are facing the pressing threat of climate change.
ISO's standards are powerful tools for taking action and the May issue showcases stories from companies benefiting from ISO standards, such as a Namibian fish processor or a large Brazilian company in the paperboard market, implementing management systems standards for quality and environmental or food safety as well as occupational health and safety.
Ocean-Based Food Security Threatened in a High CO2 World
oceana.org - September 24, 2012
Emissions from human activities are changing the ocean’s chemistry and temperature in ways that threaten the livelihoods of those who depend on fish and seafood for all or part of their diets. The changes may reduce the amount of wild caught seafood that can be supplied by the oceans and also redistribute species, changing the locations at which seafood can be caught and creating instability for ocean-based food security, or seafood security. This report ranks nations based on the seafood security hardships they may experience by the middle of this century due to changing ocean conditions from climate change and ocean acidification. This is done by combining each nation’s exposure to climate change and ocean acidification, its dependence on and consumption of fish and seafood and its level of adaptive capacity based on several socioeconomic factors. Country rankings are developed for risks from climate change and ocean acidification independently, as well as from both problems combined.
Climate Change Takes a Bite Out of Global Food Supply
A Pakistani fisherman talks with young boys. Rising ocean temperatures are pushing many fish away from the tropics towards the poles where waters are cooler. (Credit: Akbar Baloch/IPS)
commondreams.org - by Stephen Leahy - September 29, 2012
Humanity’s ability to feed itself is in serious doubt as climate change takes hold on land in the form of droughts and extreme weather, as well as on the world’s oceans.
Less well known to many is the fact that emissions from burning oil, coal and gas are both heating up the oceans and making them more acidic. That is combining to reduce the amount of seafood that can be caught, according to a new report released here.
(SEE ADDITIONAL INFORMATION HERE - Ocean-Based Food Security Threatened in a High CO2 World)
http://resiliencesystem.org/ocean-based-food-security-threatened-high-co2-world
Probability Maps Help Detect Food Contamination
Sandia's stochastic network metholodogy accelerates spread of food-borne illness // Source: sandia.gov
submitted by Luis Kun
Homeland Security News Wire - October 1, 2012
Researchers demonstrate how developing a probability map of the food supply network using stochastic network representation might shorten the time it takes to track down contaminated food sources; stochastic mapping shows what is known about how product flows through the distribution supply chain and provides a means to express all the uncertainties in potential supplier-customer relationships that persist due to incomplete information
Uncovering the sources of fresh food contamination could become faster and easier thanks to analysis done at Sandia National Laboratories’ National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center (NISAC).
Questions to Stimulate Discourse Regarding A Collapse in Food Distribution Systems
Michael McDonald’s Original E-Mail
From: Michael McDonald
Sent: Monday, September 17, 2012 5:48 AM
To: John T. Hoffman; Tom McGinn
Cc: Ross, Robert G; Linton Wells; Samuel Bendett; David A Hastings; Gresalfi, Michael; Timothy Siftar; Rahul Gupta; Luis Kun; Carl Taylor; gavin; Tim Stephens; Christine Springer; Lyerly, William; Gavin Mcgregor-Skinner; Ray Shirkhodai; Allen Clark; David Franz; Gary Vroegindewey
Subject: Questions to Stimulate Discourse Regarding A Collapse in Food Distribution Systems
John, Tom, and colleagues,
I will be interacting with food distributors, state emergency managers, a state food council, and other food and emergency management stakeholders regarding preparations for a massive food crisis in the U.S. They have asked for a series of general questions for stimulating a discussion about their management and governance in severe crises associated with food. I would like to have your input into the framing of this discussion. Many of the same questions need to be directed at medical supply distributers as well. Here is the first draft series of my questions:
Spain Recoils as Its Hungry Forage Trash Bins for a Next Meal
Images: In Spain, the unemployment rate is over 50 percent among young people (Samuel Aranda for The New York Times)
nytimes.com - September 24th, 2012 - Suzanne Daley
On a recent evening, a hip-looking young woman was sorting through a stack of crates outside a fruit and vegetable store here in the working-class neighborhood of Vallecas as it shut down for the night.
At first glance, she looked as if she might be a store employee. But no. The young woman was looking through the day’s trash for her next meal.
(VIEW COMPLETE ARTICLE)
The G-20 and Food Security
Image: Farmer with corn.
submitted by Robert G. Ross
stanleyfoundation.org - September 2012
Spikes in the price of staple food commodities are pushing the issue of food security higher on the G-20 agenda. The Mexican finance ministry confirmed that the topic will be prominent for the next meeting of deputy finance ministers and central banks on September 23–24. The officials are mindful of the 2008 global crisis that sparked food riots in some 30 different countries, as well as the G-20’s own commitments to tackle price volatility. Prices rose by an alarming 10 percent earlier this summer, though the most recent reports have shown them stabilizing.
(VIEW COMPLETE ARTICLE)
Sudan Refugees Flee Intensified Bombing Runs
foxnews.com - Associated Press - September 19, 2012
Newly arrived refugees at a camp along the volatile South Sudan-Sudan border say renewed fighting between rebels and Sudan's military is likely to send thousands more people to an expanding camp here filled with refugees of war and hunger.
As the fighting intensified, tens of thousands began streaming into South Sudan. Since February, the population of Yida has skyrocketed from 17,000 to around 65,000 refugees.
