#FAO; #SustainableGlobalEconomy; #Bioeconomy; #FoodLoss; #plasticPollution; 

FAO/Canadian-Media: Wasted food. Polluted seas. Landfill sites full to bursting. After years of using our precious natural resources as if they were limitless, the outcomes of our behaviours are making it clear that it is time to change our ways. And the answer? Well, a no-waste, environmentally and socially considerate bioeconomy is an excellent place to start. 

So, what is a sustainable, circular bioeconomy? 

Essentially, a sustainable, circular bioeconomy is a system that is groundbreaking and restorative, one that boosts industry and the economy but also protects our planet for future generations. This includes shifting towards bio-based alternatives to plastics and fossil fuels, eliminating the use of toxic chemicals and cutting down on waste through innovative materials, products, systems and business models. It also means harnessing the power of bioscience and biotechnology to address the challenges we face, like providing food, feed, fibres, wood-products and bio-based chemicals, including alternatives to plastics, for a growing population while preserving our natural resources. 

Here are five ways that FAO is helping the transition to a sustainable and circular bioeconomy for better food production, better nutrition and livelihoods and a better environment:

1)   Reducing food loss and waste

We know that a growing population and rising incomes will lead to increased demand for food and agricultural products, putting more pressure on natural resources. Alleviating problems related to intensive crop and livestock farming or overfishing means being more responsible in our food production and consumption, reusing food that would ordinarily end up in landfills and increasing food production in a sustainable way.

FAO is working with countries around the world to analyse food value chains and reduce food loss at various stages. Currently, 14 percent of all food produced is lost from harvest up to retail. A substantial amount is also lost at consumer level. A circular bioeconomy means reducing food loss and waste by strengthening value chains but also by finding new uses for lost or wasted food.

With their expanding populations, cities have a big part to play in consuming more responsibly. FAO has helped the municipality of Lima, Peru to create a food waste taskforce that has established a composting centre for managing biomass waste. As a result, the amount of organic waste disposed of in landfills and city drainage has been cut dramatically.

2)   Tackling plastic pollution

One major goal of a sustainable and circular bioeconomy is to use more materials made from natural, biodegradable resources, cutting down on plastic waste and CO2 emissions.
Reducing plastic used on farms is a big part of this. These plastics can be especially hard to recycle because many are contaminated with pesticides and fertilisers. Consequently, FAO is launching a new Agricultural Plastics Initiative to assess the magnitude, fate and impacts of plastic products used in agri-food systems globally. The initiative will offer alternatives to plastics and promote the use of biopesticides and organic fertilizers to reduce contaminated plastic waste.
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Other innovative examples for cutting down on plastics are also in place elsewhere. For example, in Mexico, a partnership between a prominent adult beverage company and a car manufacturing company aims to produce bio-based materials with by-products from the processing of agave. Often, much of the residue is burnt or sent to landfills. Now, the two companies are developing a lightweight, bioplastic from the agave residues. These bioplastics will be used in the car company’s Mexican assembly plants.

Two major goals of a sustainable, circular bioeconomy are increasing the use of biodegradable resources to cut down on plastic waste and diversifying our food production to help protect and promote biodiversity.

3)     Diversifying our diets and moving our reliance away from only a few crops
Of over 6 000 plant species that have been cultivated worldwide for food, we rely on only 9 crops for 66 percent of our food production. 

FAO’s work on increasing biodiversity, particularly in agri-food systems, focuses on enhancing the number of foods and species on which we rely. This can help promote crop diversification, moving away from the economic benefits of monocropping. 

Moreover, diversification boosts nutrition. In many agricultural communities, people rely on one staple crop whose seasonality implies a period of food shortage. Boosting promotion of local, lesser known globally but highly nutritious crops, such as cassava or millet, can help communities better fulfil their dietary needs and support the biodiversity of crops grown.
 
4)     Promoting bio-based products as alternatives to synthetic fertilisers and pesticides
The overuse of chemical fertilisers and pesticides already leads to problems of water and soil pollution, as well as greenhouse gas emissions. Finding bio-based solutions to these chemicals is that much more important with a growing population to feed.
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One innovative example of bio-based solutions comes from China where the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Finance are currently carrying out a programme that explores using straw as a fertiliser. Straw is a common by-product of wheat and grain production and using it as a fertiliser solves two problems in one: cutting down on the use of chemical fertilisers and giving farmers an alternative to burning the left-over straw, which is a common practice but a large source of pollution.

5)     Restoring degraded lands and improving livestock management 
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Many people around the world rely on livestock farming for their livelihoods but doing so in unsustainable ways can lead to land degradation.  FAO’s Climate-Smart Livestock project promotes sustainable livestock management in many parts of the world. For example, in Ecuador, an initiative implemented with the support of Global Environment Facility and the Ecuadorian government provides farmers with practical training such as how to install irrigation systems, drinking fountains and milking infrastructure. Farmers also learn new production methods like rotational grazing, composting for pastures and producing their own animal feed, which helps prevent land degradation and makes livestock farming more sustainable.
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There is no single path for establishing a bioeconomy and sustainability does not happen automatically. However, with successful examples already in place, FAO, together with the International Sustainable Bioeconomy Working Group, is building on this momentum by working towards the creation of Sustainable Bioeconomy Guidelines. These will include good practices, tools and guidance on how to develop monitoring frameworks, helping countries implement national bioeconomy strategies, policies and programmes in a sustainable way.
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A sustainable, circular bioeconomy makes sense, not only environmentally but also socially and economically. Sustainability is an opportunity, one that we need to take to protect our planet and secure a better future.

“Ajay Chopra from Winnipeg and I connected online, and I was thrilled to learn that I had a Canadian namesake. The Canadian Chopra is a successful community-minded entrepreneur with connections to politics and business.  We started chatting, and I really appreciated his warmth and his zaniness.  We decided that a Cookoff with my namesake would be fun and cool, while allowing me to introduce my fans to Canada. And it will create a larger audience for my signature dish of  Butter Chicken,” said Mumbai's Chef Ajay Chopra an acclaimed culinarian as well as one of the most celebrated chefs in the Indian television and food industry. 

Chef Chopra will present his signature recipe of Butter chicken Live which is a favourite cuisine across the globe.
 
 “Butter Chicken is a staple of Indian cuisine, and we felt this was an amazing concept to bring to people Live while learning direct from a master chef and my friend Ajay Chopra.  We are proud to sponsor this very unique and rare special COVID cookoff,” says Hari Brar, CEO, SHER Flour Mills.  
 
“It’s a great honour and gift to collaborate for this rare online cooking lesson with India’s leading Celebrity Chef, my namesake and a wonderful person with whom I’ve forged a friendship.  In this Live Instagram session, we will be cooking butter chicken from scratch together for viewers to follow and learn. Our goal is to create a diversion during these challenging times,” says Ajay Chopra from Winnipeg, Canada. 

With a passion for public and government relations that grew from a series of internships while still a student, first at the Canadian Embassy in Paris and then at the Canadian High Commission in London, England, Ajay Chopra from Winnipeg also possesses strategies that create mutually beneficial collaborations for clients and their target audience. 

Join him Live on Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/ajaychopra99/

The event is further supported by Growing Pathways to Immigration and also by Imagebuilderz, Canada’s foremost PR experts, who will be Media partners for this unique event.   
 
"We are delighted to come on board as a media partner and look forward to the culinary experience and partnership between Canada's Ajay Chopra and India's Ajay Chopra," says Renu Mehta, CEO, Imagebuilderz in Toronto.​​

#UN; #WFP; #FoodInsecurity;#BurkimaFaso; #Covid19; #FAO

​UN/WorldFoodProgram, Aug 23 (Canadian-Media): Urgent and sustained action is needed to address worsening food and nutrition insecurity in Burkina Faso, say the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), citing alarming new data. Some 3.3 million people are estimated to be facing acute food insecurity during the current lean season, that period which precedes the harvest in September.​

The latest analysis by the Cadre Harmonisé  indicates an increase in acute food insecurity of more than 50 percent since the situation in Burkina Faso was last assessed in March.Experts say the crisis has been exacerbated by the impact of COVID-19 on people’s ability to earn money to cover their daily needs in a country already reeling from conflict and climate change.

Two provinces in the Sahel region – Oudalan and Soum – have been driven into the Emergency phase of food insecurity, as defined by the Cadre Harmonisé. Some 3 percent of people in these northern areas are said to be experiencing catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity and facing extreme food consumption gaps, also resulting in alarming levels of acute malnutrition. Many of those worst affected have been displaced from their homes by fighting in the region.

“We’re seeing an alarming deterioration in food security across the worst-hit parts of the country,” said David Bulman, WFP Country Director and Representative in Burkina Faso. “We need to take immediate action to reverse this trend in the two provinces. It would be nothing short of a disaster were a whole generation to be crushed by conflict, displacement and hunger.”

“The COVID-19 pandemic is further exacerbating a crisis that was already deteriorating at a worrying pace, pushing more and more people into severe food crisis and acute food insecurity,” said Dauda Sau, FAO Representative in Burkina Faso. ”We can reverse this trend if we act now by supporting the Government to protect livelihoods, rapidly increase local food production and availability, and support rural populations to access food.”

Many of those most at risk are subsistence farmers and livestock herders. While urgent humanitarian life-and livelihood-saving assistance is needed to address immediate needs, so too is longer-term investment in rural livelihoods and social services which, say experts, can help reinforce social cohesion and contribute to peace.

FAO and WFP have been responding to the crisis in Burkina Faso by providing food assistance coupled with livelihood protection and support for displaced people and the host communities that receive them.

BritishColumbia; #CenturyFarmAward; ArdillRanch; #Agriculture

British Columbia, Aug 1 (Canadian-Media): Ardill family is celebrating 100 years of ranching in British Columbia (B.C) in 2020 and would be receiving a Century Farm Award (CFA) for its contribution and dedication to B.C. agriculture, media reports said.

Ardill's Ranch. Image credit: Flickr

​Agricultural organizations that have been active for a century or longer, as well as pioneers whose farms and ranches have been in families for 100 years or more, are honored with CFAs.

Each CFA celebrates the rich heritage of farming and ranching families and organizations in B.C.

Lana Popham, B.C.'s Minister of Agriculture said in a news release that the Ardill family has been an integral part of farming in the Peace region for multiple generations in B.C.'s rich history of agricultural  industry and added,

“I’ve had the incredible pleasure of visiting the ranch, touring the land with Renee and Karen, and sharing a coffee with the family in their home. My heart was full after a day at the Ardill Ranch and I look forward to a day when I can visit again. I wish everyone at Ardill Ranch, and the members of the Ardill family the best and congratulations on 100 years of farming in B.C." 

Lana Popham. Image credit: Twitter handle

Born in Ireland, Jack Ardill immigrated to Canada in 1909 at the age of 19 met his future wife, Betty, while in Holland as a prisoner of war.

The newlyweds, Jack and Betty, returned to Canada in 1919  moved to Edmonton where their first son, John, was born in February 1920.

In May 1920, a Homestead and Soldiers Grant for the ranch location in the Peace River District by Jack and Betty was filed and brought with them a team of horses, a cow and calf, some chickens, a plow, a mowing machine and rake, some furniture, a tent and a year’s grubstake, essential for homesteading.

With passing of time, the ranch boundaries grew and more parcels of land were accumulated. The cattle population also grew as more land was put under cultivation. During those busy days, Jack and Betty’s family also grew, welcoming their daughter Betty, and sons Richard (Dick) and Tom.

After 100 years, the ranch is still family-run and is almost entirely self-sufficient for gardening and food – both for home and for livestock.

Today, the area is home to about 400 head of commercial Hereford cattle, who spend their summers on the range and winters in the valley. Grain and hay silage form approximately 60 percent of the total feed supply, while the rest is put up as round bales.
 
As an important part of life on the ranch, horses, some of which were brought to the ranch from the Edmonton area, are still the main access to summer range, used for salt packing, range patrol, cattle work, rodeoing and pleasure riding.

A successful cow-calf operation, the ranch is a place where hard work and fun go hand in hand.

Proud to be part of the community, Ardill's Ranch participates in community events, such as high-school work-experience programs, forage tours, annual Hudson’s Hope preschool tours, rodeo and rodeo sponsorships, hockey sponsorships and Hudson’s Hope Fall Fair.

More than over 65,000 people from all the multi-cultural communities were attracted to this family-friendly event which had more than 85 vendors.  The day was bright and it being the long week-end, people - young and old, children in colourful dresses-accompanied by their parents, enjoyed the delicacies presented by the food festival.  ​ ​More than 500 different Indian dishes were there representing each and every state of India and more than 50 percent of vendors were sold out 2-3 times.

Some people were enjoying the food and others were also watching the classical dances, bhangra, music, musical melodies by singers. Then there was a live DJ from 12:00 noon to 10:00 PM nonstop. The festival was a true example of multiculturalism and attracted diverse communities. ​