Publications
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Avoiding Bioenergy Competition for Food Crops and Land
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Nine
by Tim Searchinger and Ralph Heimlich - January 2015Installment 9 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future shows that any dedicated use of land for growing bioenergy inherently comes at the cost of not using that land for growing food or animal feed, or for storing carbon.
It recommends several policy changes to...
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Wetting and Drying: Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Saving Water from Rice Production
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Eight
by Tim Searchinger, Tapan K. Adhya, Bruce Linquist, Reiner Wassmann and Xiaoyuan Yan - December 2014Installment 8 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future explores the potential to improve water management in rice production in order to reduce agricultural greenhouse gas...
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Crop Breeding: Renewing the Global Commitment
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Seven
by Tim Searchinger, Craig Hanson and Jean-Marc Lacape, Le Centre de Cooperation Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD) - July 2014Installment 7 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future explores improvements in crop breeding that have the potential to boost yields, including marker-assisted breeding,...
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Indicators of Sustainable Agriculture: A Scoping Analysis
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Six
by Katie Reytar, Craig Hanson and Norbert Henninger - June 2014Installment 6 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future explores the methods and analysis of a scoping exercise to identify a preliminary list of indicators related to...
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Improving Productivity and Environmental Performance of Aquaculture
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Five
by Richard Waite, Malcolm Beveridge, Randall Brummett, Nuttapon Chaiyawannakarn, Sadasivam Kaushik, Rattanawan Mungkung, Supawat Nawapakpilai and Michael Phillips - June 2014Installment 5 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future explores the potential role of aquaculture in meeting global fish demand in 2050, finding that aquaculture production...
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Creating a Sustainable Food Future: Interim Findings
A menu of solutions to sustainably feed more than 9 billion people by 2050
by Tim Searchinger, Craig Hanson, Janet Ranganathan, Brian Lipinski, Richard Waite, Robert Winterbottom, Ayesha Dinshaw and Ralph Heimlich - December 2013The world’s agricultural system faces a great balancing act. To meet different human needs, by 2050 it must simultaneously produce far more food for a population expected to reach about 9.6 billion, provide economic opportunities for the hundreds of millions of rural poor who depend on...
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Improving Land and Water Management
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Four
by Robert Winterbottom, Chris Reij, Dennis Garrity, Jerry Glover, Debbie Hellums, Mike McGahuey and Sara Scherr - October 2013In this working paper, Installment 4 of Creating a Sustainable Food Future, we examine the role of four improved land and water management practices and the effect they...
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Achieving Replacement Level Fertility
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Three
by Tim Searchinger, Craig Hanson, Richard Waite, Brian Lipinski, George Leeson and Sarah Harper - August 2013The United Nations projects that world population will rise from just over 7 billion in 2012 to nearly 9.6 billion by 2050. This paper examines the nature of the population challenge globally, the effect of population growth on food demand in Sub-Saharan Africa, and the potential benefits―in...
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Reducing Food Loss and Waste
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment Two
by Brian Lipinski, Craig Hanson, Richard Waite, Tim Searchinger, James Lomax and Lisa Kitinoja - June 2013About 24 percent of all calories currently produced for human consumption are lost or wasted. This paper examines the implications of this amount of loss and waste, profiles a number of approaches for reducing it, and puts forth five recommendations for how to move forward on this issue. "...
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The Great Balancing Act
Creating a Sustainable Food Future, Installment One
by Tim Searchinger, Craig Hanson, Janet Ranganathan, Brian Lipinski, Richard Waite, Robert Winterbottom, Ayesha Dinshaw and Ralph Heimlich - May 2013How can the world adequately feed more than 9 billion people by 2050 in a manner that advances economic development and reduces pressure on the environment? This is one of the paramount questions the world faces over the next four decades. “The Great Balancing Act” seeks to start answering this...