Putting back meaning into “sustainable intensification”

Many recent high profile papers on food security argue something along these lines: First, food security is a growing concern, and a growing human population with changing diets will require larger amounts of food. Second, to meet the future demand for food, a global increase in food production is needed. And finally, to achieve global food security without compromising even more of Earth’s surface for agricultural purposes, “sustainable intensification” is a way to optimise agricultural production. A new paper offers one of the first critical appraisals of “sustainable intensification” in the academic literature. (With thanks to Ideas for Sustainability).