Food for thought on the looming environmental crisis

FOR many businesses in Singapore and the region, Earth Day on April 22 provided a great opportunity to "do good" for the environment. On the 45th anniversary of the annual occasion, big and small businesses alike took part in recycling projects, clean-up efforts, and initiatives to reduce waste. It seems that as societal and corporate awareness has grown around the need to become better stewards of our planet, so too has the collective commitment by business to do just that. In short, it's become more than just a way to check the CSR box - and that's a good a thing.

But there's a growing environmental issue that hasn't entered the consciousness of many in the business community or elsewhere. It's in fact a looming crisis with dire implications for South-east Asia and the globe. I'm referring to the increasing demand for food and its toll on the earth.

Today, farmers around the world are doing their best to feed a growing population. While there are around seven billion mouths to feed in total, the number grew by roughly 75 million just last year. Estimates suggest the world's population will well exceed nine billion people by 2050, and Asia alone is projected to have roughly one billion more people calling it home than it does currently. At the same time, a number of factors are working against our farmers to make their task a particularly daunting one. The realities of water scarcity, land degradation, climate change, and a shrinking availability of cultivatable land are increasingly putting a strain on farmers' ability to feed the world while still preserving the planet and its precious resources. In short, farmers are being asked to produce more and more while using less and less.