The Future of Food

We take our food for granted. Supermarket shelves groan with an incredible variety of produce – produce of all seasons, and from all over the world. But at the end of 2007 and into 2008, we saw that the international food system is not as stable as it looks. Is this justthe beginning of a new era of food – an era when the old certainties are radically overturned?

Travelling to America, Latin America, India, Africa and Europe, this series unravels the complicated web of links that binds the world together, bringing food from farm to table and asks what needs to happen to avert a major global food crisis.

From intensive farming in the Punjab to the effects of climate change in Nairobi, the first programme examines the world food situation and investigates the magnitude of the looming crisis. Growing populations, rising consumption of hard-to-produce foods likemeat, shortages of oil, and a climate that changes unpredictably – these factors could push food prices dangerously high.

The second programme looks for the answers. What are we doing about the food crisis and what should we do in the future? In Havana, food is grown within the city – in gardens and allotments. Will we all have to start digging up our gardens to make vegetable patches? Or could GM food hold the answers? A trial being funded by the UK government is trying to create wheat that makes its own fertiliser using genes from clover.

The programme also investigates some of the more unusual solutions for the food crisis, like laboratory produced meat, multi-story farms, and growing plants and fish together in a symbiotic ecosystem.

We face a genuine world crisis in food supply. This series offers a remarkable journey through the world’s food system and uncovers the hidden dangers that threaten its survival.