Global Food Consumption

12 Key excerpts on "Global Food Consumption"

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  21st Century Geography: A Reference Handbook

  • Joseph P. Stoltman(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • SAGE Publications, Inc

    (Publisher)

  Notwithstanding these contrasts, it may come as a sur- prise to learn that the trend in food consumption is the opposite of what one might expect. The developing coun- tries are becoming more like the developed countries in their food consumption patterns. In a word, the global pattern of food consumption is convergent, and the aggre- gate level of global variation is diminishing. However, huge regional differences are still apparent, especially when military or ethnic conflict prevents access to food and water. Methods for Measuring Food Consumption at a Global Scale There are several possible approaches to measuring food consumption. For example, a survey based on a representative sample of the world's households could be conducted, perhaps with a small honorarium to encourage the person responsible for household food acquisition, storage, preparation, and serving to keep a week-long journal of what was consumed by each member of the household. In essence, this is a scientific version of the more impressionistic account we get from What the World Eats (Menzel & D' Alusio, 2008). (Continued) 404 • HUMAN GEOGRAPHY (Continued) In many parts of the world and most notably in rural areas, the diet varies enormously depending on the season: rainy or dry, cold or warm. Thus, a survey approach would have to allow for the seasonal character of food consumption. In urban areas, households tend to eat many meals separately outside the home. It would be difficult for a survey respondent to track the large number of institutional, street-side, or restaurant meals eaten separately by each household member. A second approach to measuring food consumption is indirect; it follows a balance sheet approach that begins with the amount produced, and, after adding inflows and subtracting outflows, it arrives at "disappearance," which is presumed to have been consumed by human beings. At a global scale, this procedure is followed by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO, 2010).

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  Eating, Drinking: Surviving

  • Walter Spiess, Farhana Sultana, Peter Jackson(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Springer Open

    (Publisher)

  It is a dynamic system which has changed dramatically in the past and will in the future (Rosegrant et al. 2012 ). Goodman and Sage ( 2013 ) assert that “ there is almost nothing more geographical than food in the ways that it intimately interlinks production and consumption, nature and society, bodies and landscapes, the global and the local, and indeed spaces, places, and everywhere in between ” (p. 3). This chapter maintains that the E. Young ( & ) School of Sciences (Geography and Environment), Staffordshire University, Leek Road, Stoke-on-Trent ST4 2DF, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2016 P. Jackson et al. (eds.), Eating, Drinking: Surviving , SpringerBriefs in Global Understanding, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-42468-2_2 13 food system has become one of the most important globally embedded networks of production and consumption; its integral connections with the petroleum industry and global security only serve to con fi rm its centrality and signi fi cance (Le Billon et al. 2014a , b ; Goodall 2008 ; Weis 2009 ). Geographical perspectives on food illuminate a cruel paradox at the heart of contemporary globalization. Why do millions of people still die from hunger and hunger-related diseases while the health of millions is threatened by an obesity pandemic? In a world where millions enjoy a more varied diet than ever before and waste nearly as much as they eat, why does food scarcity still haunt millions? Meanwhile countries as varied as China, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt now suffer a “ double burden ” where under nutrition coexists with obesity as a major public health problem; a strange world too where “ some people destroy food because prices are too low, and others literally eat dirt because food prices are too high ” (Angus 2008 : 1).

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  World Hunger

  • Liz Young(Author)
  • 2002(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  There is ample evidence that the world food system is becoming increasingly integrated, so that who eats and who does not, and what they eat or do not eat, is now influenced by global processes which are quantitatively and qualitatively different from global processes in the past. This chapter overviews inherited international processes that govern access to food before detailing some of the most recent transformations of the global production, distribution and marketing of foods, which is creating new winners and losers in the competition over the production and consumption of food.

  The changing geography of global food production and consumption, from the sixteenth to the twentieth century

  The geography and diffusion of plants and animals in the ancient world, from Mesopotamia and other agricultural hearths, is a fascinating study, and trade in luxury foods existed in the centuries before European expansion: the trans-Saharan salt trade; the wine trade, which connected the Mediterranean regions to Northern Europe; the trade in olive oil; the trade in eastern spices to Europe. However, these transactions never represented a significant element of the diets of the majority of people, or even of the diets of the élite. The great bulk of food production and consumption was localised until capitalism emerged and diffused with the European conquests. The focus of this section is on some of the more important connections made between regions and peoples and their diets since European expansion and colonisation, that is, some important foundations of the contemporary global food system.

  The discovery of the Caribbean as a sugar-producing system initiated a process of producing a food cheaply in one location and transporting it in large volumes to be consumed in another. The case study of northeast Brazil (see Box 2.3

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  Innovation in Healthy and Functional Foods

  • Dilip Ghosh, Shantanu Das, Debasis Bagchi, R.B. Smarta, Dilip Ghosh, Shantanu Das, Debasis Bagchi, R.B. Smarta(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  125 9 Changing Global Food Consumption Patterns An Economic Perspective Srikanta Chatterjee * 9.1 INTRODUCTION AND OUTLINE OF CHAPTER As.a.basic.necessity.of.life,.the.availability,.quality,.and.affordability.of.food.are.of.great.concern.to. both.individuals.and.nations.alike . .The.world.enjoyed.several.decades.of.relative.stability.in.the. price.of.basic.items.of.food,.including.food.grains,.following.the.introduction.of.some.new,.high-yielding.seed.varieties,.better.irrigation,.and.use.of.fertilizers.in.the.1960s . .This.helped.raise.the. production.of.wheat.and.other.grain.cereals.quite.dramatically,.and.the.world.came.to.enjoy.a.much. improved.food.environment.with.reliable.and.affordable.supply.of.several.basic.items.of.food . .The. period.from.the.early.1970s.to.1990.saw.world.food.grains.and.oilseeds.output.rise.steadily,.by.an. * . The.research.toward.this.chapter.started.when.the.author.was.a.Visiting.Senior.Fellow.at.the.Center.for.International. Studies.of.the.London.School.of.Economics.(LSE).in.May.and.June.2011 . .He.wishes.to.acknowledge.the.hospitality.of. the.Center,.especially.for.the.access.he.enjoyed.to.the.British.Library.of.Social.Sciences,.which.is.located.at.the.School . . He.also.wishes.to.record.his.appreciation.to.The.Riddet.Institute.and.to.Massey.University.for.granting.him.the.leave.to. take.up.the.Fellowship.at.the.LSE . CONTENTS 9.1 . . Introduction.and.Outline.of.Chapter. .................................................................................... 125 9.2 . . Global.Food.Supply.in.Context. ............................................................................................ 126 9.3 . . Global.Food.Consumption.Trends. ........................................................................................ 127 9.3.1 . . Quick.Note.on.the.Measurement.Issue. ..................................................................... 127 9.3.2 . . Structural.Changes.to.Global.Consumption.Patterns.

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  Food Processing and Bioactive Compounds

  • Reddy, Y. S.(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Genetech

    (Publisher)

  9 Food Processing and Food Consumption Food production is by far the dominant form of land use. The human diet varies widely in different parts of the world, but Figure 1 illustrates the composition of the average food intake in 1996. Some items, such as alcoholic beverages derived from cereals and fruits, are excluded. Cereals remain the mainstay of the human food supply, but significant changes have taken place over the past four decades. Per capita consumption of cereals and meat rose 17 percent and 36 percent respectively, while per capita consumption of fish and seafood rose 57 percent. Consumption of leguminous plants such as rice and soybeans, valued for their high protein content, rose in absolute and per capita terms. Vegetables, starchy roots and pulses all declined in importance on a per capita basis, though total consumption increased. Also significant has been the increase in consumption of what might be termed “lifestyle” products such as coffee, tea and alcoholic beverages. Coffee production, for example, has risen by 37 percent since 1961 and the harvested area now accounts for about one percent of total arable land. Rising incomes, together with the development of sophisticated food processing and distribution systems and a liberalised world trade regime, have enabled consumers in the industrialised countries, and many affluent centers in the developing world, to enjoy unprecedented choice in the foods they eat. As a result, many countries have re-oriented part of their agriculture sector towards export products including “exotic” food items, and feedstuffs for livestock. This ebook is exclusively for this university only. Cannot be resold/distributed. Figure 1. World Food Consumption, 1996 (kg/capita/year) Food Production and Population Growth Between 1960 and 1996, the world’s population rose from 3 billion to 5.8 billion, an unprecedented rate of increase which posed a major challenge to food producers.

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  Home Cooking in the Global Village

  Caribbean Food from Buccaneers to Ecotourists

  • Richard Wilk(Author)
  • 2006(Publication Date)
  • Berg Publishers

    (Publisher)

  Food as a Way of Understanding Globalization Food is an ideal topic through which to understand the history of globalization because it literally connects our bodies to the world, bridging every scale of analysis. Food connects politics to health, mega-corporations to the kitchen table, and our everyday imaginations, wants and hungers to a whole sweep of time and history. Because food is both a physical substance and a vehicle for the imagina-tion, something that nourishes the body, but also fascinates and moves the mind, it plays a protean role in the world, connecting the economic and the symbolic in ever-shifting ways. It is the perfect channel for paradox, because it is always transformed and processed in substance and meaning on its way from raw material to cooked 14 • Home Cooking in the Global Village meals. In the right hands, anonymous profane wheat can become a holy sacrament. Similarly, food produced lovingly through hard labor in a home kitchen can enter the market and end up as one more trendy fashion food for yuppies, or for sale in a plastic national pavilion in Disneyworld. Imported foods can look local, and local foods completely foreign. Authentic-looking local farmers’ markets can be popu-lated by retired urban executives running gourmet cheese operations, selling to the middle-class children of parents who ran away from the family farm. The emer-gence of new kinds of local, ethnic and national cooking can take place among emi-grants and exiles in faraway countries, or through the hijacking of culture by the tourist industry. Most deceptive of all, the transformation of food production and consumption in places like Belize always appears to be something new and unprecedented. The present seems to be a unique moment in the emergence of Belize onto the global stage. But as I will show, this moment has been happening for hundreds of years. During its entire history, Belize has both imported and exported food.

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  Acknowledging Consumption

  • Daniel Miller(Author)
  • 2005(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  6GEOGRAPHIES OF CONSUMPTION

  Peter Jackson and Nigel Thrift

  INTRODUCTION

  Geographical research on consumption has expanded dramatically in the last decade, transcending traditional divisions in the subject between the economic and the cultural and coming to occupy something of a vanguard position. Traditionally, economic geographers have concentrated on the location of economic activity and, more recently, on the transition from Fordist to more flexible modes of production, charting the shift from manufacturing to service industries and tracing out the evolution of an increasingly global economy. In contrast, social and cultural geographers have traditionally been more concerned with the distribution of goods and services (particularly items of collective consumption such as education and public housing), focusing on inequalities of gender, race and class. But, like economic geographers, they, too, tended to ignore many areas of everyday consumption such as shopping, advertising and the media. Today, an understanding of the processes of consumption is central to debates about the relationship between society and space. Geographical perspectives on consumption—and on the dialectics of globalisation and localisation, and the shifting boundaries of the public and the private—have begun to command attention across the social sciences as part of a growing interdisciplinary concern with ‘mapping the futures’ (Bird et al. 1993).

  Geographies of consumption have progressed beyond generally descriptive analyses of retailing and supermarket location most especially to embrace theoretically informed research on restructuring and deregulation (Bromley and Thomas 1993; Clarke 1991, 1995; Crewe and Davenport 1992; Crewe and Forster 1993; Ducatel and Blomley 1990; Marsden and Wrigley 1994; O’Brien and Harris 1991; Wrigley 1988; Wrigley and Lowe 1995). Geographical interest in consumption is also manifested in numerous studies of shopping malls (Butler 1991; Chaney 1990; Goss 1992, 1993; Hopkins 1990, 1991, 1992; Shields 1989, 1991; Winchester 1992) and spectacular sites of consumption such as world fairs and expositions (Ley and Olds 1988; Pred 1991). There is also a growing interest in a range of other consumption spaces from tele-shopping to car boot sales (Davies and Llewelyn 1988; Gregson and Crewe 1994) and evidence of an increasing historical depth to geographical understandings of contemporary consumption (Clarke and Purvis 1994; Domosh 1990; Glennie and Thrift 1992, 1994; Miller 1983, 1991). While shopping malls and world exhibitions may have become, in Benjamin’s terms, ‘sites of pilgrimage to the commodity fetish’ (Benjamin 1978: 151), geographers have done more than simply map their changing locational dynamics. Pred’s work, part of a large-scale comparative project, exemplifies this trend, examining various consumption sites in Stockholm (from the Art and Industrial Exhibition of 1897, through the city’s early twentieth-century shopping arcades, to the contemporary mixed-use, retail-entertainment complex of the Globen) (Pred 1991). Following his earlier work on everyday language as a form of ‘consumer resistance’ to the universalising tendencies of modernity (Pred 1990), his recent work on consumption theorises such resistances in terms of ‘symbolic discontent’, articulated in complex ways with historically and geographically specific capitalist modes of production (Pred and Watts 1992).

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  Consumer Behaviour in Food and Healthy Lifestyles

  A Global Perspective

  • Isaac K Ngugi, Helen O'Sullivan, Hanaa Osman(Authors)
  • 2020(Publication Date)
  • CAB International

    (Publisher)

  Technology advancement has dramatically allowed the food and drink industries to produce greater quantities of food at a faster rate. This has also expanded the range of activities and provided more choice to customers. The majority of the world’s farms are small with less than one hectare (72% of all farms), but surprisingly, they only occupy a very small proportion (8%) of global agricultural land. The most important food source for human consumption in the world is cereals. However, global livestock production is considered the largest user of agricultural land. Organic agriculture has continued to expand during the last few years and the growth is expected to continue. The food system is globalized and interconnected. More and more consumers are aware of and interested in a healthy lifestyle concomitant with increasing levels of literacy in health and wellbeing. There are significant food losses and waste across the value chain. Hence, there is a significant quantity difference between the amount of food produced and that which is actually consumed. In addition to supply chain performance improvements, a change in consumer behaviour at post-purchase stage may perhaps mitigate this situation.

  Discussion Questions

  1. Why is it important to understand consumers' behaviour regarding food and drink?

  2. What can we learn from global trends of production and consumption of food and drink products?

  3. What are the implications of the various characteristics of food and drink to marketing?

  4. What can we learn from global trends relating to food distribution, undernutrition, and disposal and wastage of food and drink?

  5. What should be done to address the disparity between the types and quantities of foods produced vis-à-vis the types and quantities of food required by the world’s population?

  References

  Agricultural Marketing Research Centres (2017) Organic food trends profile. Available at: http://www.agmrc.org/markets__industries/food/organic-food-trends-profile/ (accessed 1 November 2018).

  Arnould, E., Price, L. and Zinkhan, G. (2004) Consumers, 2nd edn. McGraw-Hill/Irwin, Boston, Massachusetts.

  Blackwell, R.D., Miniard, P.W. and Engel, J.F. (2006) Consumer Behaviour, 10th edn. Thomson, South-Western College Publications, Cincinnati, Ohio.

  Blythe, J. (2014) Principles and Practice of Marketing, 3nd edn. Sage, London.

  Defra (2014) Food Statistics Pocketbook 2014. Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, London.

  FAO (2011) Global food losses and food waste – extent, causes and prevention. Study conducted for the International Congress, Düsseldorf, Germany.

  FAO (2015) World Food and Agriculture 2015

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  The Nutrition Transition

  Diet and Disease in the Developing World

  • (Author)
  • 2002(Publication Date)
  • Academic Press

    (Publisher)

  The fi rst element relates to the interaction between food and nutrition and the envi-ronment – the issue of sustainable consumption. The second is social inequality – the extent of poverty and food insecurity. The third is governance, the notion that, if human policy “frames” nutrition, then human forces should themselves be shaped to do this equitably, responsibly, and effectively. The English word “governance” refers not just to what governments do, but also to the actions of other powerful social forces, such as private business. The last element is culture, a key and often a missing component in the nutrition tran-sition debate. Food culture is the “pull” in the transformation of tastes, just as marketing and corporate reach are the “push”. Copyright © 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd All rights of reproduction in any form reserved The Nutrition Transition ISBN: 0-12-153654-8 Globalization and the nutrition transition A distinction must be made between the nutrition transition and the wider socioeco-nomic process of globalization, which refers to the process by which goods, people, and ideas spread throughout the world. The subject has been the source of much excitement in sociological and political circles recently, to which the topic of food can add a suitably gentle corrective. Globalization of food is, of course, nothing new. Plants have moved and been moved around the globe for centuries.

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  Improving Water and Nutrient-Use Efficiency in Food Production Systems

  • Zed Rengel(Author)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Wiley-Blackwell

    (Publisher)

  In addition to adaptation measures, mitigation strategies are required as well, such as improved crop, grazing, and livestock management. This can include agronomic practices such as efficient nutrient use, reduced tillage, and recycling management (IPCC 2007). Agricultural practices relying on the traditional knowledge of farmers might embody a wealth of location-specific adaptation and risk management options and aim to protect soils, biodiversity, and water aquifers (International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development [IAASTD] 2009; World Bank 2010). Finally, policies and institutions need to be strengthened to encourage timely implementations of adaptation and mitigation practices (Padgham 2009).

  Global Food Consumption

  In this section, we present demand-side options to meet the increasing food demand, such as shifts in the dietary composition or reducing food wastage.

  The world population is projected to rise to 9 billion people by 2050. The population in developing countries is projected to rise from 5.6 billion in 2009 to 7.9 billion in 2050, whereas population in developed countries is expected to increase from 1.23 billion to 1.28 billion (UN 2009). The increase in incomes of a large fraction of the world’s population may be accompanied by substantial increases in consumption of food as well as quantities of waste or discarded food (Henningsson 2004).

  Meeting the world’s food requirements in the future may require changes in dietary patterns and composition as well as a reduction in food waste. Food intake in terms of calories, proteins, and fat differs considerably between developed and developing countries (Table 1.2 ), reflecting the ­mismatch between overconsumption of food in some regions of the world and undernourishment in others.

  Table 1.2 Dietary patterns per capita in developed and developing countries as well as worldwide (2003–2005).

  Source : Food and Agriculture Organization (2010b).

  The physiological energy demand of humans depends on a number of factors such as age and sex, as well as, physical constitution and activity. However, assuming frequently stated daily average energy consumption of 2,500 kcal/capita, the average energy consumption in ­developed countries appears rather high in contrast to the group of developing countries. Such excess or “luxury” demand may consist of products with little nutritional value (such as soft drinks) but may have large impacts on resource demand and environmental quality. For example, the growth in calorie availability of about 600 kcal/capita per year from 1983 to 2000 in the United States has been estimated to result in an additional land demand of 0.46 ha/capita (Blair & Sobal 2006). Obesity and its corresponding health problems may be a consequence of ­excessive calorie intake; there are more than 1 billion people in developed and developing countries ­classified as obese (World Health Organization [WHO] 2003), leading to a double burden of both undernourishment and overconsumption in many countries (Schmidhuber & Shetty 2005).

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  Contemporary Issues in Food Supply Chain Management

  • Jane Eastham, Luis De Aguiar, Simon Thelwell, Jane Eastham, Luis De Aguiar, Simon Thelwell(Authors)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Goodfellow Publishers

    (Publisher)

  The determination of these to effectively deliver global food security will require considerable deliberation and innovative thought. Global shifts in the consumption of food The food and drink culture we experience today is totally different from that prior to World War II. Millstone and Lang (2003) highlighted in the Atlas of Food the interconnectivity of internationalised supply chains, which enabled most con-sumers to have continual access to food. The majority of the world’s consumers do not need to think where the daily bread, rice, noodles or porridge might be coming from. The way some foods reach the plates of an entire globalised population depends on very complex links and exchanges, which also reflect a cultural shift in the role that food has taken, especially in more economically developed coun-tries. Yet, the transformative nature of the changes of the links and exchanges has been relatively fast and encompassed the whole world. Seldom are there places where this cannot be felt, thus, the transformation of the food supply chains has affected not only societies in more developed economies but also in less economi-cally developed societies. In the process, their food cultures have indeed been transformed. In the African, Asian and South American continents, instead of the traditional food staples, wheat has become the predominant carbohydrate consumed at breakfast, lunch and dinner. Out went the tortilla, congee, yam with honey, baked sweet potatoes and couscous, and in came the bread roll, the pasta and the sandwich. What, where and how people eat, according to Millstone and Lang (2003), is dependent upon a growing interconnectivity of international trade. International supply chains are increasingly elongated and dependent on many stages of production, where value is added. No longer is the local food system sufficient to provide consumers’ needs, and increasing amounts of the food eaten today have to be imported.

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  Food System Sustainability

  Insights From duALIne

  • Catherine Esnouf, Marie Russel, Nicolas Bricas(Authors)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Cambridge University Press

    (Publisher)

  2 Consumption and consumers Authors: pierre combris, bernard maire and vincent rØquillart Contributors: france caillavet, armelle champenois, sandrine dury and sØverine gojard Analysis of the medium- and long-term evolution of global food con- sumption highlights some striking regularities. This chapter addresses the potential consequences of a generalisation of these trends, before focusing on their determinants and in particular the factors that might alter current trends to promote greater sustainability. Six main areas are covered: the characteristics of long-term changes to diet, the international convergence of food models and evolution of the situation in Southern countries, the bio-physiological determi- nants of changes to consumption, the role of agricultural policies, the identi- fication of factors that may change trends and, finally, the heterogeneity of consumption and nutritional inequalities. One of the major issues addressed by this working group was to determine whether dietary trends and their underlying major determinants were the same in all countries, or whether on the contrary it was possible to identify differ- ences that might indicate alternative pathways for change. The same concern led the group to look at break points in past consumption trends, concerning meat in particular, insofar as they might lead to a clearer understanding of the mechanisms underlying the alteration of long-term trends and the emergence of new dietary standards. 2.1 Characteristics of long-term dietary trends Work on the history of economics (Bairoch, 1997; Braudel, 1979; Toutain, 1971), of agriculture (Mazoyer and Roudart, 2002) and of food Food System Sustainability: Insights from duALIne, eds. Catherine Esnouf, Marie Russel and Nicolas Bricas. Published by Cambridge University Press. © Cambridge University Press 2013. 27 economics (Ce ´pe ` de and Lengelle ´, 1953) has shown that diets evolve under the effect of powerful nutritional and economic determinism.

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