Revised Edition 2019 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
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Revised Edition 2019 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Written and researched by: Ian Fitzpatrick, Richard Young and Robert Barbour with Megan Perry, Emma Rose and Aron Marshall. We would like to thank: Kath Dalmeny Adele Jones Christopher Stopes David Gould Stuart Meikle Marie Christine Mehrens Anil Graves Dominic Moran Thomas Harttung Jules Pretty Patrick Holden Hannah Steenbergen for helpful comments on draft versions or sections of the report. All interpretation, opinion and error is the responsibility of the authors alone. Designed by: Alan Carmody, Midas Design Consultants Ltd. and Blue Moon Creative Production Coordinator: Hannah Steenbergen Printed by Vale Press Ltd. First published November 2017 Revised and corrected July 2019 We would like to thank the following organisations for their invaluable support for our work on True Cost Accounting, as well as the Brunswick Group, who kindly hosted our report launch in November 2017: THE HIDDEN COST OF UK FOOD FOREWORD 3 PREFACE TO THE 2019 EDITION 5 PREFACE 7 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 8 Hidden costs in 2015 ............................................................................................................................................8 Challenges to be overcome .............................................................................................................................10 Addressing the challenges ..............................................................................................................................10 The purpose of this report ...............................................................................................................................10 Recommendations .............................................................................................................................................. 11 1. INTRODUCTION 12 The problem with hidden costs ...................................................................................................................... 14 Agricultural externalities ................................................................................................................................... 16 True cost accounting ......................................................................................................................................... 18 Previous true cost estimates ........................................................................................................................... 19 Note on methodology ....................................................................................................................................... 19 2. NATURAL CAPITAL DEGRADATION 22 Greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution .............................................................................................. 22 Food waste ......................................................................................................................................................... 25 Soil degradation ................................................................................................................................................. 26 Water .................................................................................................................................................................... 28 3. BIODIVERSITY LOSS 30 Loss of ecosystem biodiversity due to agriculture ..................................................................................30 4. FOOD CONSUMPTION-RELATED HEALTH COSTS 34 Cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer and dental caries ................................................................. 34 Malnutrition ......................................................................................................................................................... 35 Overweight and obesity .................................................................................................................................. 36 Hypertension ...................................................................................................................................................... 37 Dementia ............................................................................................................................................................. 38 5. FOOD PRODUCTION-RELATED HEALTH COSTS 39 Antibiotic resistance ......................................................................................................................................... 39 Food poisoning ..................................................................................................................................................40 Organophosphate pesticides .......................................................................................................................... 41 Colon cancer from nitrate in drinking water ............................................................................................... 42 1 6. FARM SUPPORT PAYMENTS & REGULATION 44 FOREWORD Professor Jules Pretty OBE, sector separated from the environment, 7. FOOD IMPORTS 46 University of Essex emerging from the philosophical dominance of a Estimating the hidden cost of food imports ............................................................................................... 46 Cartesian view of nature as machine. This led to Hidden cost of importing palm oil ................................................................................................................. 47 an assumption of two opposed entities: people Think of this. Half of all children you know with constructed systems of food production, now will live to the 22nd century. They will have and wild nature out there in the environment. 8. SOCIAL, CULTURAL AND ETHICAL ISSUES 48 adopted sufficient components of healthy living In the 1980s, Stuart Hill from the radical to see them pass a hundred years. Their life Animal welfare .................................................................................................................................................... 48 Hawkesbury College in Sydney and then of journeys will take them through the point where Mental health ...................................................................................................................................................... 49 McGill University, developed a concept of world population will stabilise, then start to fall in The price of food ............................................................................................................................................50 change in agricultural systems that helps plot some places, for the first time in human history. Employment and labour conditions ............................................................................................................... 51 both steps towards new and more effective They will know a world where agriculture, Cultural impacts of changes in agricultural production ........................................................................... 52 systems, and set a scale for ambition. Hill the business of producing food, improves observed “there is something seriously wrong the natural capital of the planet rather than with a society that requires one to argue for 9. POSITIVE EXTERNALITIES 53 depleting it. sustainability,” and suggested there were three Biodiversity and wildlife habitats ................................................................................................................. 53 You might observe that this is a rather rosy view critical stages: i) Efficiency; ii) Substitution; and Soil carbon sequestration ............................................................................................................................... 53 of the future, and surely other problems will iii) Redesign. Nitrogen fixation ................................................................................................................................................ 54 intervene: political disturbance, climate change, Efficiency focuses on making best use of pests and disease, floods. Some of these may resources within existing system configurations. represent possible existential threats, many will 10. TRUE COST ACCOUNTING IN PRACTICE 55 Why waste costly inputs or resources? result in greater temporary hunger and ill-health. Efficiency gains include targeting inputs of The case for a tax on nitrogen fertiliser ...................................................................................................... 57 But with the expected changes in consumption fertiliser and pesticide to focus impact, reduce The case for incentivising farmers to increase soil carbon levels ........................................................ 58 patterns, combined with population growth, use and cause less pollution and damage to The case for integrating nature conservation with food production .................................................. 59 we must hope that year on year, the world’s natural capital and human health. The first farmers will produce more food from existing progression is thus from prophylactic, calendar- agricultural land. Many are already doing so 11. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 60 based and reactive approaches towards with responsibility and care for environments problem cure and then prevention. Adding up the hidden costs of food production ....................................................................................... 61 and people. They are part of redesigned food Calculating the hidden