01 Feb Cropland and delivering nutrition to the world’s population
Global crop foods are central to the delivery of nutrition to the world’s population, but requires the use of land for crop production. A newly published paper (and accompanying animation) from the SNi® team details the extension of the DELTA Model® to include cropland footprints, and some of the insights generated.
In a previous Thought for Food, we detailed the importance of global crop production to the supply of nutrients to the global population. The new publication ties this back to the land required for that production, and details the mathematical modelling framework used to forecast future changes in land requirement.
The modelling tells us which crops have the greatest variation in yield, and where in the world crops are grown at the highest yields. The combination of crop modelling with nutrition data allows insights into some of the consequences of changes to global food production for people and planet.