This discussion paper explores conceptualisations of food security produced by the World Trade Organisation and the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations and examines a responsive policy framework food sovereignty – championed by the farming and peasant movement Via Campesina. Conflict over the use and appropriation of plant genetic resources is examined to highlight tensions...

In 2005, few would have predicted the current revolution in global agriculture that is being driven by a sudden rise in the price of petroleum and a rapid expansion of global biofuel production from grain, sugar, and oilseed crops. The result has been a convergence of valuation between petroleum and agricultural commodities such that food prices are likely to rise substantially. While countries...

We used stable isotopes of carbon and nitrogen to examine the diversity of microbial populations consumed as foods at deep-sea hydrothermal vents. Invertebrate consumers at Gorda and Juan de Fuca Ridge vent sites had variable carbon isotope compositions, implying the use of more than one microbial food resource. 6’C values for consumer invertebrates at Gorda ranged between 13.2% (polynoid polyc...

2. At its Fourteenth Session (2013), the Commission endorsed the Genebank Standards for Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, contained in this document. The Genebank Standards were originally endorsed by the Commission in 1993. In 2009, the Commission requested FAO to revise the Genebank Standards in cooperation with the relevant international organizations to ensure up-to-date con...

OBJECTIVE Magazines targeted at children under 12 years old are growing in popularity; past studies have asserted that food items are rarely exposed, but methodological issues may have covered the true extent of covert promotion. The primary purpose of the present study was to quantify the nature and extent of the promotion of branded food products in Australian children's magazines. DESIGN W...

A retrospective population-based case-control interview study has been conducted in three distinct areas in the north of England where local excesses of children with leukaemia have been reported. A total of 109 cases of childhood (0-14years at diagnosis) leukaemia and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma who were born in one of the study areas and diagnosed there between 1974 and 1988 were included in the s...

INTRODUCTION Sesame (Sesamum indicum L., Pedaliaceae) is a very old cultivated crop and thought to have originated in Africa (Ram et al. 1990). However, Oplinger et al. (1990) have indicated it to be a highly prized oil crop of Babylon and Assyria about 4,000 years ago. The Chinese burned sesame oil for light and to make soot for their ink blocks. African slaves brought sesame seeds, which they...

Invasive plants as novel food resources, the pollinators’ perspective 2 Ignasi Bartomeus, Jochen Fründ and Neal M. Williams 4 1 Estación Biólogica de Doñana Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (EBDCSIC), Dept. Integrative Ecology. Sevilla, Spain. 6 2 University of Guelph, Dept. Integrative Biology, Guelph, ON, Canada 3 University of California, Dept. Ento...

The Food Wastage Footprint model (FWF) is a project of the Natural Resources Management and Environment Department. Phase I of the project has been commissioned to BIO-Intelligence Service, France. This Summary Report presents the preliminary results of the FWF modeling, as related to the impacts of food loss and waste on climate, land, water and biodiversity. The full technical report of the F...

Immediate action is required in the Mediterranean to address environmental degradation that is mainly driven by consumption patterns. Increasing stress on biological and social systems is put by unsustainable consumption patterns. Food consumption patterns are important drivers of environment degradation. The objective of this review paper is to explore natural resources-food nexus in the Medit...