Food security

• CHADDS FORD, Pa., March 14, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Queen's University Belfast (QUB) and MOBILion Systems, Inc. have launched a partnership to advance food safety by innovating test methods and tools that aim to quickly identify contaminants, enhancing current technologies for better detection.
• The goal is to ensure consumer access to safe, nutritious food, highlighting both organizations' commitment to public health.
• Their work focuses on improving the detection of contaminants such as mycotoxins and PFAS, leveraging QUB's extensive sample libraries and expertise to set new standards in food safety testing.
• This will significantly enhance our food security research within the Institute for Global Food Security, Queen's University Belfast.

• SERRA DO SALITRE, Brazil, March 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- EuroChem today celebrated the opening of its new phosphate fertilizer production facility in Serra do Salitre, State of Minas Gerais, Brazil.
• With a total project investment of nearly US$1 billion, the new phosphate mine and plant complex was constructed in record-breaking time and will have an annual production capacity of 1 million tonnes of advanced phosphate fertilizers, significantly increasing the reliability of domestic phosphate fertilizer supplies to Brazilian farmers.
• EuroChem is a leading international fertilizer producer, with products ranging across all three major nutrient groups: nitrogen, phosphate, and potash.
• In South America, in addition to its Salitre complex, EuroChem has blending facilities and a wide distribution network, employing over 3,000 people in Brazil.

• Moreover, Treetoscope has been recognized for its groundbreaking technology with the prestigious 2023 New Product Contest Tier 1 award by the American Irrigation Association.
• This accolade underscores the company's contribution to the irrigation industry and its commitment to sustainability and efficiency in agriculture.
• This innovative approach addresses the critical challenge of water scarcity in agriculture, offering a sustainable solution to enhance food security worldwide.
• For more information about Treetoscope's technology, investment opportunities, or partnership inquiries, please visit www.treetoscope.com or contact Dotan Eshet at [email protected] .

• Problems in Canada’s food system are being felt from field to fork — and they are increasingly hard to swallow.
• After a year of skyrocketing food costs, Canada’s Food Price Report 2024 predicts a further increase of 2.5 to 4.5 per cent for grocery store price tags.
• One cause for these higher prices — apart from corporate greed — is attributable to more difficult environmental conditions for farmers.

Agroecology

• Around the world, this approach to farming is often called agroecology.
• Agroecology refers to the use of specific farm management practices that recycle nutrients and resources and benefit from interactions between multiple species of crops and animals in the same area.
• Agroecology differs from other, perhaps more familiar, farming systems like organic or regenerative.
• However, farmers in our study offer glimpses into their visions for agroecology as they attempt to translate its principles onto the prairie landscape, despite overlapping challenges.

Prairie agroecology

• In our recent study we interviewed farmers from 19 farms across the Prairies — during the 2021 season — and found that with enough commitment and support from their surrounding community, agroecology can be a viable path forward.
• Burnout is a serious issue for farmers practicing agroecology.

Bringing more people to the land

• Additionally, policies must be developed that support and encourage farmers who use ecological farming practices — especially young farmers.
• Bringing more people to the land should also respond to this historical context.

Prairie agroecology can help a just transition

• However, a transition to ecological farming on the Prairies is not just a matter of agricultural practice, but also of social justice.
• These are huge challenges and we feel agroecology can help address them while also building better relationships between people and the land.

Evan Bowness receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Jessie MacInnis receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Canadian Graduate Scholarship - Doctoral program.