In light of current population increase projections, it is estimated that the food supply

would require almost one-hundred-percent increase by 2050. Although in order to feed the
projected 9.5 billion people in thirty-two years from now, food production would only have to
increase sixty-percent. Instead of increasing agricultural production, it would be necessary to
decrease agricultural waste and the use of biofuels. In order to feed the world in 2050, people
need to reduce the amount of waste and spoilage that result from agriculture products and
biofuels. By eliminating these obstacles, the amount of agricultural used for food consumption
will greatly increase. I believe that the other thirty percent of increase is going to be from
decreasing our food waste and biofuels.
Although as of right now we produce twice as much food today than we actually need,
we waste two-hundred and forty-two pounds per person a year in the United States. This food
could be used to help people everywhere that are hungry. People need to be more thankful for
what they have and understand that most people don’t get to sit down and have dinner with
their families every night. According to Sarah Small, the Chief of Staff at Food Tank, “The hungry
are not hungry because the world lacks food. We grow enough food right now to feed about
ten billion people, yet according to the U.N. nearly one billion of today’s seven billion people
are chronically undernourished and well over one billion suffer from significant malnutrition, in
a world of plenty.” We can help by improving the trucks that the food is imported on. Trucks
also cause a lot of waste by the time they get to where they are going with the food. We throw
away over fifteen percent of food at retail. By communicating with consumers hopefully we can
decrease the amount of food that we throw away a day.
Agriculture today has one of the biggest challenges, feeding the world by 2050. We are
going to have to learn how to do more with less. We are not going to be able to double all of
our livestock by 2050. It would be a struggle trying to find land for all of them and be able to
feed them all. Instead, we need to take care of the animals and land like Mary Lou’s farm did.
To accomplish this seemingly impossible task they increased their cows milk from nine gallons a
cow to ten gallons a cow. By caring about these animals and their well being we can increase
products the same way. It is less about making radical changes to agricultural production and
more about making sustainable increases to agricultural productivity. We need more farms
than what we have today if we are going to succeed in feeding over two billion more people in
just thirty-two years. Having more farms does not mean we have to have more livestock, we
can increase that some but we have to think about what is best for the livestock. If there are so
many cows in a pasture or in a milking parlor that they are uncomfortable they are not going to
produce as much milk; however, keeping the cows comfortable is a reliable way to ensure that
they are going to produce more milk than before.
Although they might not appear to, small farms have just as much of an impact as big
farms do. Without small farms we would not know all we do about agriculture and
sustainability that we do today. Small farms are a huge part of the agricultural community even
though they do not get the recognition that they deserve. By recognizing the impact that small
farms can make on agricultural production, the possibility of feeding the increased world
population by 2050 is greatly increased because of small impacts adding together to make a
positive change. In class we talked about third world countries having a lot of hungry people. I
think if we expand what we know about technology and how to improve agriculture as we
know it today to the third world countries it could help tremendously with their need for food.
By teaching them how to start and continuously improving small farms in their world would be
a big blessing to them. Although some third world countries have small farms, they don’t know
as much as we do about how to take care of their animals and produce more products. By
teaching and maintaining farms it could help feed the population by 2050.
Most people probably do not understand how big of an issue this really is. I personally
did not know until I took this class. It is honestly a scary feeling that we don’t know exactly how
we are going to feed the world in thirty-two years. At that time most of us in this class will only
be fifty years old. It is very stressful to know that the agriculturalists today have this much
stress to handle and still be able to figure out how we are going to to feed 9.5 billion people.
However scary this idea may be, the agricultural community can come together to make a
positive and sustainable change in feeding the world by cutting down the amount of
agricultural waste, reducing the use of biofuels, and placing a focus on small farms. Agricultural
production does not need to increase by one-hundred percent by 2050 but rather the use of
agricultural products needs to become more sustainable. By using these three tactics to help
with the world food issue, feeding the world in thirty-two years will no longer appear to be such
a daunting task. Agriculture has been a huge part of my life and I believe that my generation
can make it to where we can feed everyone by 2050.

References: Waste Not, Want Not: An Overview and Combating Food Losses and Food
Waste; J. Brad Morgan, Food Waste Must Be Addressed Before We Can Feed a Growing
Population; J Brad Morgan, Feeding 9 Billion this Generation is Up For a Challenge, and
Foodtank.com