275Abstract
The question of food production implies social, ethical,
economic and environmental aspects that in recent
times have become increasingly important and rel-
evant. The global food production heavily relies on
fossil resources, among which the most important
is oil. Up to now, the modern food system has been
based on the assumption of an unrestricted avail-
ability of low-cost fossil resources. Moreover, its ex-
pansion contributes to global warming due to the
emission of greenhouse gases.
From an energy efficiency standpoint, the modern
food system is the least effective industrial system:
it consumes more energy than it produces. A study
on the environmental impact of the products and
services used in the EU- 25 has evidenced how the
food and drink, tobacco and narcotics are collectively
responsible for 22– 3 1 percent of the global warming.
Recently, owing to problems linked to the food system
sustainability, it was considered how changes in
lifestyles could influence greenhouse gas emissions.
Consumer choices could play a leading role. Dietary
choices could give their contribution not only to
health, but also to the sustainability of the agricultural
system. In recent years, some indicators were devel-
oped in order to evaluate the environmental perform-
ance of food production systems like food miles and
Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) of the food supply chain.
The challenge is to develop and exploit the tools nec-
essary to better understand the sustainability of food
chains, optimize sustainable primary production and
identify consumer attitudes towards sustainable food
production. In this context, the Mediterranean diet
would represent a key resource for sustainable de-
velopment around the Mediterranean Basin and
worldwide. The diet is grounded in respect for the en-
vironment and biodiversity, and ensures the preser-
vation and development of traditional activities and
crafts related to the fishing and farming communities.
The energy issue
The continuing world population growth, rapid eco-
nomic development (even if interspersed with peri-
ods of stagnation and recession) and – above all –
the request of emerging countries to benefit from
the economic boost, inevitably imply the need for
greater energy requirements. Global food produc-
tion heavily relies on fossil resources, among which
the most important is oil. As a consequence, every
threat to the regular supply of oil is a threat to food
security, that is to the availability of and access to
safe food, adequate for a nutrient diet. Our modern
agro-industrial food system is comparable to the
other industrial systems for its complex structure
and the amount of energy used. Furthermore, it can
also be considered as part of the same industrial
economic system which is traditionally thought to
operate like a bubble floating in the space, benefit-
ing from an unlimited supply of natural resources,
bolstering economic activities and pouring waste in
the environment. The environment is therefore the
only one to pay, in the form of waste, the environ-
mental costs of the entire economic system.
Up to now, the modern food system has been based
on the assumption of an unrestricted availability of
low-cost fossil resources. Moreover, its expansion
contributes to global warming due to the emission
of greenhouse gases. As Herman E. Daly has as-
serted for a long time, modern economies must be
considered as subsystems of larger ecosystems and
have to function within those constraints. That is to
say, modern economies must be able to manage
limited resources and create sustainable develop-
ment at the same time. The entire food system uses
energy, both directly and indirectly, and depends on
fossil resources: chemical industry products, mainly
fertilizers and pesticides, farming machines and
their fuel, energy for water supply and its distribu-
tion, for the transport of agricultural products, for
their transformation and packaging and, finally, for
the distribution to the final consumers. In the last
century, in the western countries, the progress of
genetics, mechanics and chemistry (the green rev-
olution) as well as the low cost of energy, have de-
termined the development of the food system,
ensuring copious and good quality food production.