Diverse Foods Are Important to Sustaining a Healthy World and Healthy People

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A Bangladeshi mother feeds her children small, nutrient-dense fish, seaweed and leafy vegetables. Credit: Finn Thilsted / WorldFish

CALI, Colombia, Nov 5 2024 (IPS) – It is often said that we are what we eat. However, our food is a reflection of the health of our food systems, environment and agricultural diversity.

In the same way that our bodies need many nutrients for good health, the environment also benefits from processes that produce different types of food, each of which makes different needs, and contribution to the natural environment.

Unfortunately, the world’s food supply fails to balance food from land and water systems. Although more than 3,700 aquatic species provide many nutritional benefits, consumption is limited to a few fish, seafood, and other aquatic species. Similarly, only six crops account for more than 75 percent of energy from plants.

Relying on the same few foods, whether crops, livestock or fish, not only limits the quality of nutrition provided, but also destroys natural resources, from soil health to water quality. This hampers efforts to address global malnutrition and the increasing pressure on the environment and agricultural systems.

After delegates gathered at the UN COP16 talks on biodiversity to agree on the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, this is an important time to support food diversity for health and nutrition, agricultural diversity and informed decision-making within food systems.

From a human development perspective, food diversity is important to ensure that people get enough nutrients to meet their nutritional needs. This means making full use of a wide variety of plant and animal foods from land and water.

Inadequate nutrition is the leading cause of preventable diseases, contributing to 11 million deaths in 2017. At the same time, dietary diversity has been linked to a reduced risk of death as well and diet-related diseases, including diabetes and heart disease.

Many underutilized foods, including seafood, especially small native fish species, seaweeds, and bivalves such as clams, scallops, and mussels, can provide a wide variety of nutrients. readily available, while improving health outcomes.

For example, in Bangladesh, nutrient deficiencies such as anemia cause significant public health problems. To solve this problem, researchers have developed a public production of small fish chutney to supplement the diet of pregnant and lactating women. The results showed that adding small fish chutney to the diet reduced anemia among these women by a third.

Integrating a wide variety of foods, including neglected but nutritious seafood, is critical to improving nutrition and health worldwide.

At the same time, food diversity can support the conservation of agricultural diversity and maintain a healthy environment by creating demand for more food.

Due to the repeated cultivation of genetically identical crops, the world has lost 75 percent of its plant genetic diversity in the last century. This not only affects the capacity of the food system but also increases the vulnerability of crops to pests, diseases and weather-related disasters.

The world’s dependence on rice, wheat and maize for energy means that the world’s food supply is very limited when these crops are adversely affected by climate change such as droughts or floods. These cereal crops also place similar frequent demands on natural resources, which can affect soil and water quality and biodiversity. This ultimately results in supply vulnerability and undermines global food security and nutrition.

Instead, growing a variety of food crops including indigenous crops, such as sorghum, millet and yams, and applying agricultural education principles can support food security goals. better. Initiatives such as the Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils (VACS), supported by CGIAR, use the potential of indigenous and locally adapted crops to support agricultural diversity. For example, legumes can convert nitrogen in the soil into ammonia and other compounds, which helps the non-legume crops grown next to them.

Science and evidence can help governments, policy makers and other stakeholders in food systems to identify gaps in agricultural diversity to promote food diversity and food production, and to support diversification strategies. natural resources.

For example, tools such as the Periodic Table of Food and Agrobiodiversity Index can help map food quality and improve existing knowledge about agricultural diversity by gathering relevant data to measure the sustainability of global food systems. in width.

These tools can inform national priorities for ensuring healthy, diverse food from healthy, diverse sources. They can also facilitate the implementation of global commitments to protect biodiversity, supporting the implementation of the World Natural Framework.

Meanwhile, the conservation of crop and animal genetics in gene banks or biobanks is important to protect the best practices for future species that are better adapted to provide the necessary nutrition and resilience the climate.

Prioritizing food diversity can have positive benefits for people and biodiversity, reducing reliance on foods that damage the environment and provide poor nutritional value.

But this requires not only a renewed commitment, but also effective actions, investments and goals to preserve the genetic resources of all species needed for a healthy, diverse diet.

Now that the UN talks on biodiversity have ended, we call on parties to commit to integrating sustainable nutrition practices into the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Strategy to support biodiversity. world resources, food security and nutrition and health.

IPS UN Bureau