Food Ladder is featured as a sustainable solution to address food insecurity in the newly released State of the Tropics: Sustainable Infrastructure Report 2017.
Professor Sandra Harding Vice Chancellor & President, James Cook University Convenor of State of the Tropics Project says, “This landmark report, the result of an international collaboration between leading research institutions from across the world’s tropical zone, offers a different perspective on the world… recognising the critical importance of the tropics and its key role in the global future”.
Food Ladder is profiled as vital infrastructure and education program to feed vulnerable populations in the region where:
▪Just over half of the world’s children under 15 years old currently live in a tropical region – by 2050, two out of every three will be living in the tropics.
▪By 2050, more than half of the world’s people will live in the region.
▪Growth in the value of trade in the tropics is more than twice that of rest of the world.
▪By 2050 the world population will reach 9.5 billion and we will need to increase food production by 60% to meet this increased need, under conditions much more challenging than those we are already experiencing.
“The development of sustainable, resilient and inclusive infrastructure lies at the heart of addressing the region’s most significant challenges,” says Professor Sandra Harding. “As the world heads towards 9.5 billion people by midcentury and races towards an urban future, feeding the world’s population, meeting its housing needs, providing energy and access to basic services for all, while ensuring environmental sustainability and limiting climate change impacts will require significant new investment, innovation and approaches to infrastructure development and management.”
In the words of Norman Ernest Borlaug Nobel Laureate, “you can’t build a peaceful world on empty stomachs and human misery.”
Food Ladder profiled on page 148. Read the report here.