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A new report, released by Oxfam, reveals that land used to power European cars with biofuels for just one year could produce enough wheat and maize to feed at least 127 million people. In addition, the EU biofuel target also effects European consumers through higher fuel prices at the pumps. Oxfam's ‘The Hunger Grains’ report confirms that biofuels are definitely not the solution to climate change they promised to be. It has been calculated that meeting EU biofuel targets could be as bad for the environment as putting 26 million extra cars on Europe's roads as biofuels displace other crops onto forests, peatlands and grasslands - all of which keep greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere. Biofuel targets introduced in 2009 to help fight climate change have become progressively more controversial. In Europe, the targets will be met almost exclusively from food crops at a time of record prices. Barbara Stocking, Oxfam's Chief Executive, said: "The EU must recognise the devastating impact its biofuel policies are having on the poorest people through surging food prices, worsening hunger and contributing to climate change". Key industry figures, including the CEOs of Unilever and Nestlé and billionaire hedge-fund manager Jeremy Grantham, have added their voices to NGO concern that diverting food crops to fuel for American and European cars might start a food crisis, following on from the worst US drought in half a century. Last week, French president François Hollande also called for a “pause” in the development of biofuels competing with food.

In an attempt to deal with the crippling weed resistance associated with ‘Roundup ready’ GM crops, a US based company is attempting to introduce a new, controversial, GM corn plant. The controversy surrounds the fact that the new GM product relies on a highly toxic chemical that was once a component of the Vietnam war defoliant, Agent Orange. Instead of the new crop being resistant to one chemical, Dow’s new seed is engineered to resist two. New solutions are seen as vital because “superweeds" are now so prevalent in the US, up to 15 million acres of American crops are affected. After planting GM crops over a number of years, thousands of farmers across the US are facing major problems with weeds that are so powerful that spraying them with 24 times the recommended dose of Roundup fails to kill them. One resistant weed every 10 square metres can reduce yields from productive plants by 50%. Dow says this is a more effective solution because it allows farmers to mix and match their sprays more effectively. However, controversy surrounds the fact that the new trait makes crops resistant to a chemical called 2,4-D. This powerful weed killer is currently used sparingly in agriculture because it is highly toxic and scientists are concerned that if farmers are not educated to use the new GM product properly, resistance issues will soon re-appear.

The Sustainable Food Trust’s (SFT) global food and farming campaign was launched in the UK yesterday. The organisation plans to build a global network of collaborative partnerships with individuals, organisation and those playing key roles within the wider food movement, to support collaboration and disseminate research and policy throughout the world. The Trust plans to work at all levels, locally and internationally, to build a body of better-informed public opinion about the impact of different food and farming systems on the environment, human health and society as a whole. The SFT will focus on disseminating the message that the capacity of food and farming systems to undergo a rapid transformation away from the present industrial model, towards a more resilient and sustainable alternative, will only be possible if it is reinforced by citizens who are well informed.

A briefing paper, entitled 'Women in African agriculture: farmers, mothers, innovators and educators’, was released on 17th September by London’s Imperial College, Montpellier Panel. The paper calls for urgent action to address the needs and perspectives of women in smallholder agricultural policy in sub-Saharan Africa. The Panel highlighted the fact that although women play crucial roles throughout the value chain as farmers and business women, large numbers of the poorest, most disadvantaged and marginalised people in sub-Saharan Africa are women and some of the poorest households are headed by women. The paper also illustrates how national agricultural policies often assume farmers are mostly men, even though, according to the FAO, women in some African countries spend up to 60% of their time on agricultural activities. Women farmers also contribute up to 50% of labour on farms in sub-Saharan Africa and more than 60% of employed women in sub-Saharan Africa work in agriculture. The paper therefore suggests that developing policies that focus on the needs of African women is an economic imperative as there is a major global gender gap in agriculture, which translates into a costly lost opportunity to improve the quality and quantity of the world's food supply. The paper argues that if women had the same access to, and control over productive resources as men, they could increase yields on their farms by 20 to 30%. This could raise total agricultural output in developing countries by 2.5 to 4%, which could in turn reduce the number of hungry people in the world by 12 to 17% (100-150 million). As the Montpellier Panel underlines, reaching and including women in agricultural policy in Africa will require a substantially different approach by African national governments and the European governments that wish to work with them.

'Just Label It', a US coalition calling for mandatory labelling of genetically engineered (GE) foods, today announced its endorsement for the 'Yes on Prop 37- California Right to Know' campaign. The ‘Proposition 37’ vote, to be held this November is a local referendum offering Californian citizens the chance to vote for the mandatory labelling of GE foods. Although the European Union has required GE labelling since 1997, the United States has not, and as a consequence most processed foods like cereals, snacks and salad dressings have contained ingredients from plants whose DNA was manipulated in a laboratory. In the EU companies generally formulate their products so that they do not contain any GE ingredients and so do not need labelling, and David Byrne, the former European commissioner, has confirmed that requiring GM labelling did not impact the cost of products. As Americans become more aware of the role that food plays in their health, they also want more information about what they eat, including whether it contains GE ingredients. Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Organic Consumers Association, said he expected Prop 37 to pass. In a poll of 800 likely California voters in July by the California Business Roundtable and Pepperdine University, 64.9% said they were inclined to vote in favour of Proposition 37 based on their knowledge at that time. So far, opponents of Proposition 37 have committed roughly $25 million to defeat it, with the largest contributions coming from Monsanto and DuPont which have made big investments in GE crops. Supporters of Proposition 37 have gathered $3.5 million from donors.

A report revealing how soy monoculture is advancing in Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay entitled ‘Soybean Production in the Southern Cone of the Americas: Update on Land Use and Pesticides’ has been released by the Norwegian Centre for Biosafety. The report addresses “soyization” as a regional problem, illustrating how deforestation, land consolidation, and evictions have increased now that, between these five countries, 44% of cultivated land has only the soy crop grown on it. This huge growth in production has involved the takeover and clearing of new territories, significantly increasing the use of pesticides, and seeing all five countries putting vast swaths of their territory at the disposal of Europe and Asia's needs. The report signals that the process of land consolidation amongst a few landowners has become more pronounced and confirms what peasant organizations and many researchers have warned for a decade, that soy production and land consolidation go hand in hand. An ever smaller number of producers manage bigger and bigger areas, reaching management units of 2,500 to 5,000 hectares in Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. In Paraguay, in 2005, 4% of soy producers controlled 60% of the total of all areas with this crop and in Brazil, in 2006, 5% of soy producers controlled 59% of all area dedicated to this crop. The report also highlights the widespread adoption of trangsenic soy and the implementation of direct seeding as the principle causes of the exponential increase in the use of agrochemicals, in particular glyphosate. Another factor explaining this increase is the appearance of weeds resistant to common herbicides, which provokes an increase in the use of other, complementary pesticides, themselves often more toxic, including 24D and paraquat.

The cost of pesticide-related illnesses in sub-Saharan African between 2005 and 2020 could reach $90bn, according to a UN report released on Wednesday highlighting the increasing health and environmental hazards from chemicals. The report by the UN environment programme (Unep) warned that the production of chemicals, especially in emerging economies where there are weaker safeguards, is damaging the environment and increasing health costs. It urged governments to step up action to meet a target set by the world's nations in 2002 to produce and use chemicals by 2020 in ways that minimise adverse effects on human health and the environment. Unep said chemical output has grown to $4.12tn, compared with $171bn in 1970. But of the more than 140,000 chemicals estimated to be on the market today, Unep said only a fraction have been thoroughly evaluated to determine their effects on health and the environment. The report collected scientific, technical and socio-economic data for the first time on the global production, trade, use and disposal of chemicals, their health effects, and the economic implications. It also looked at benzene, a well-known carcinogen associated with leukemia and other diseases, whose use in Asia over the past two decades has multiplied. It found that consumption of benzene grew 800% in China from 1990-2008 compared with 13% in North America. "Pollution and disease related to the unsustainable use, production and disposal of chemicals can, in fact, hinder progress towards key development targets by affecting water supplies, food security, well-being or worker productivity," UNEP's executive director Achim Steiner said.

The World Development Movement (WDM) have estimated that Barclays bank will make up to £529million in 2010 and 2011 from speculating in food markets while millions of people around the world face starvation and crippling food prices. Figures released by the WDM this week show that world food prices jumped 10 per cent in July, with maize prices hitting a record level after rising 25 per cent in the month. The price of maize in Mozambique, where people spend over half of their income on food, more than doubled between April and July while South Africans faced a 27 per cent hike in wheat prices during those three months. These figures follow a damning WDM report released earlier this year that claimed 'Massive influxes of speculative money in food markets have been driving sharp price spikes, sending the cost of food soaring beyond the reach of the world’s poorest people,' WMD policy and campaigns officer Christine Haigh said: '(Barclays) behavior risks fueling a speculative bubble and contributing to hunger and poverty for millions of the world's poorest people'. Barclays' dominance in the commodities market is widely recognised within the financial industry, winning the Risk Magazine Award for Commodity and Energy Derivatives House of the Year for 2008, 2009 and 2011. The WDM have demanded tough new rules to prevent more food crisis, 'clear, hard rules are required to control financial speculation and to help prevent another global food crisis.'

In the light of soaring food prices, the G20 countries have decided not to take joint action until the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) release its new crop report in September. In a video conference call on Monday, agriculture officials from France, the US and Mexico, which currently holds the G20 presidency, discussed current price increases with representatives from various UN agencies, including the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). Droughts in the US and poor crops harvests in the former Soviet Union have caused new fears about an imminent food crisis. According to a statement released yesterday by the French agricultural ministry, the G20 said that “the current market situation is worrying” but thanks to stable rice prices “no threat is hanging over world food security.” The aim of the conference call was to decide whether a meeting of the 'Rapid Response Forum' should be convened: a forum within the framework of the Agricultural Market Information System created by the G20 in 2011 as a response to abnormal market conditions. A decision on this has now been postponed until September 12. On Monday, FAO Director-General Jose Graziano Da Silva called on the G20 to take immediate steps to tackle the high food prices. “We need coordinated action and I believe that the G20 is responsible enough for this action”, he said. Da Silva urged the states to avoid unilateral export bans, such as trade restrictions after Russia’s 2010 drought.

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) is using ‘World Water Week’ to highlight the negative impact of water scarcity on food production. The relationship between water and food security is the topic of this year’s event organised by the Stockholm International Water Institute, taking place from the 26-31 August in Stockholm. It will bring together scientists, politicians, the private sector and civil society. According to IFAD, the link becomes particularly evident in the Near East and North Africa region, where just one per cent of global freshwater resources are located. The lack of water is limiting the potential for local food production, with irrigated agriculture already accounting for 85 per cent of total freshwater withdrawal there. “Water scarcity will become the main constraint to socio-economic development in the region, which is why it is crucial to work on integrated adaptation strategies”, said Khalida Bouzar, Director of the Near East, North Africa and Europe Division at IFAD. Benedikt Haerlin of the Foundation on Future Farming has also underlined the need to adapt the entire food production process to available water quantities. “The decisive point is actually how we maintain the water in the ground and in plants throughout the ecosystem before it evaporates”, he said in an interview with Deutsche Welle. Haerlin warned against monocultures as this agricultural practice preserves little water in the ground, thus having a negative effect on the global water cycle.