Imperial teams up with UN agency to tackle global food shortages
Designing a digital tool that could improve access to food in developing countries will be the focus of a new project at Imperial.
By 2030, 3.9 billion people are expected to be living in cities in the developing world. As these cities expand, so does the demand for food. However, families on low incomes are currently finding it difficult to access affordable and nutritious food because of rising costs, falling incomes and the inability to grow their own crops.
Researchers from the Business School will work with the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) to develop a tool that will visualise data on food production and shortages. This could help policy makers in developing countries more rapidly identify and fix problems in food production and distribution so that people living in cities get better access to food.
The underpinning data will be coming from the FAO and the digital technology will be developed by Imperial College Business School in collaboration with the Royal College of Art. Government officials could use this tool to gain insights into the supply and costs of staples in order to analyse food production and distribution networks. Ultimately this will enable them to investigate the factors behind food shortages and wastage and help officials to find solutions to these challenges.
The Engineering and Physical Science Research Council funded projects Sustainable Society Network+ and Scaling the Rural Enterprise will fund the research, which is an initiative between the UK and India that investigates how digital technologies can be used to promote rural enterprises. This project aims to develop a flourishing network of academics, researchers, companies, communities and Non-Governmental Organisations that wish to understand how digital technology can create a sustainable society.
The research activities will be coordinated by Dr Giaime Berti and Dr Catherine Mulligan, at the Business School.
Dr Mulligan said: “Populations are becoming more concentrated in and around large cities in the developing world and people are having real problems accessing nutritious food. We believe that technologies we are developing could be part of a mix of solutions that could help Governments transition to sustainable food systems.”
The partnership between the Business School and the FAO will be launched by Professor G. ‘Anand’ Anandalingam, Dean of Imperial College Business School and Olivio Argenti coordinator of the Meeting Urban Food Needs project during a two-day workshop on how digital technologies can be used to create more sustainable food systems. It will be attended by academics, practitioners and public institution representatives such as the European Commission.
The research activities will operate within the framework of the FAO’s “Meeting Urban Food Needs” project. The aim of the project is to raise awareness as well as supporting policy decisions by local government authorities on how to improve the efficiency, dynamism, inclusiveness and resilience of food systems meeting urban food needs.
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