Making Food
ENV 1 • Introduction to Environmental Studies • Spring 2025
Food insecurity Lacking regular access to enough safe and nutritious food for
normal growth and development and an active and healthy life.
• To be food secure means that food is
• Available: The supply of food is sufficient to meet needs
• Accessible: Households can obtain and afford food
• Utilized: The food provides adequate energy and nutrients
• Stable: Food availability, access, and utility is predictable
money?
you get without
What food could
By User:Aude - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3297659
Common purslane Curly dock Lowbush blueberry
Portulaca oleracea Rumex crispus Vaccinium angustifolium
Black walnut Yellow woodsorrel Oyster mushroom
Juglans nigra Oxalis stricta Pleurotus ostreatus
Why switch from foraging to
agriculture?
Neolithic Revolution
• Following the end of the
Pleistocene, societies around
the world developed food
production practices
• These coincided with shifts in
the biological features and
distributions of plants and
animals through the process of
domestication
extendedevolutionarysynthesis.com
Identifying plant domestication
• Plants undergoing
domestication
show notable
changes that
reflect traits
selected for by
human consumers
• Larger fruit
• Larger seeds
• Easier to harvest
Wild
einkorn
wheat
Domestic
einkorn
wheat
Fagan 2010 People of the Earth.
Ganj Dareh
• Archaeological site in Iranian
Kurdistan, ~10,500 years ago
• Analysis of wild goat mnh.si.edu
metatarsals indicates selective
hunting of young males
• Earliest evidence of herd
management
Age in Months
Zeder and Hesse 2000 Science 287, 2254
What comes with
farming?
• Greater sedentism
• Increased population
• Cultural elaboration
shine.cn
• Social complexity
binujohn.name
Cahokia Mounds Historic State Site. Painting by William R. Isemin
Cahokia
• Missisippian archaeological
site in Illinois, ~11th - 14th
centuries A.D.
• Large urban center of
10,000 to 15,000 people,
supported by rural
agricultural production
• Elaborate mound structures
constructed featuring richly
appointed burials suggests
strong social inequalities
Columbian exchange Exchange of diseases, ideas, food crops, and populations between
th th
Columbian
exchange and
foods
• The exchange
transformed global
diets, cuisines, trade,
and agricultural
systems
maize as food
Global consumption of
Erenstein, O., Jaleta, M., Sonder, K. et al. Global maize production,
consumption and trade: trends and R&D implications. Food Sec. 14,
1295–1319 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12571-022-01288-7
Maize consumption in
sub-Saharan Africa
• Maize, originating in
Mesoamerica, is grown on over
40 million hectares of land in
sub-Saharan Africa
• In eastern and southern Africa,
maize often makes up 20-25%
of dietary carbohydrate and
protein consumption
The Namibian
Staple food Food that is eaten regularly and in such quantities as to constitute the dominant part of the
diet and supply a major proportion of energy and nutrient needs
Consequences of the
Columbian Exchange
• Agricultural production for export
to European markets became a
driver of colonization and land
transformation in the Americas
• Introduced diseases and war
decimated Indigenous
populations and expropriated
lands
• Farm labor demands increased
imported slave labor
Soil nutrients
• In the 19th century, soil nutrients
were a significant limiting factor in
agricultural productivity
• Around 100 islands were claimed by
the US during in the 19th and early
20th centuries as sources of
phosphate and bird guano for
fertilizer
• In the early 20th century, Haber
Bosch process enabled
atmospheric nitrogen to be Chincha Islands Guano Mining,1865
converted into ammonia
Alexander Gardner, “Rays of Sunlight From South America,” 1865.
Nauru Phosphate Mining
johngollings.com
How many
people
wouldn’t be
here if it
weren’t for
nitrogen
fertilizer?
Mid-to-late 20th century technological changes in
Green Revolution
agricultural production aimed at addressing worldwide
food shortages through improved efficiency
• Expanded use of chemical
pesticides and synthesized
fertilizers
• Development of high-yielding
crop varieties through genetic
modification
• Widespread adoption of
mechanized harvesting and
controlled irrigation systems
By NightThree, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=55919
Hybridization
• Pioneering work to improve productivity of staple
crops in Mexico and the Philippines began in the
1950s and 1960s, funded by international aid
organizations (e.g., USAID, World Bank)
• Cultivars developed through these programs adopted
in India and Pakistan in 1960s and 1970s to address
food shortages
By cjuneau - Wheat Field, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=37286400
Environmental impacts of industrial
agriculture
Terrestrial Aquatic
• Soil erosion from clearing and • Pollution and nutrient influx
mechanical tilling from run-off
• Declining soil fertility due to • Groundwater depletion due to
overuse and monoculture consumptive use
• Loss of biodiversity due to Atmospheric
habitat destruction and • GHG emissions from livestock
pesticide use and fertilizer
• Decreased sequestration due
to decreasing forest cover
Changes to farming
Percentage of US labor force in agriculture
Ruggles et al. 2004
“Everyone has the right to a standard of
living adequate for the health and well- In 2023, the world produced…
being of himself and of his family,
including food, clothing, housing and • 9.9 billion metric tonnes
medical care and necessary social of primary crops (cereals,
services, and the right to security in the sugar crops, vegetables,
event of unemployment, sickness, fruits, roots and tubers)
disability, widowhood, old age or other
lack of livelihood in circumstances
beyond his control.”
• 321 million metric tonnes
of animal meat
—Universal Declaration of Human
Rights • 180 million metric tonnes
(UDHR) (U.N. 1948), Article 25 of seafood
Despite all the food we
produce, why are people
still going hungry?
