Social
The attitude of consumers towards food and agriculture is heavily dependent on the availability and abundance of food in its various forms. In those parts of the world where the scarcity of food is such that individuals have only sufficient to satisfy their very basic calorific intake or are malnourished and suffer hunger, there is little thought given to the source of the food or its safety and quality.
However, in those parts of the world where there is a plentiful supply, many consumers feel passionately about their food, its method of production, quality, origin and effect on their health, as well as its price. In no other industrial sector are there so many factors contributing to a direct consumer involvement in the products delivered. This provides both an enormous challenge and a huge responsibility for the agrifood industry.
In the past two decades or so most developed countries have seen a dra-matic rise in concerns among their citizens over the quality and safety and long-term health effects of their food. A number of safety issues related to the food supply chain (local, national and international) have provided legitimate background for consumer groups to demand political action. For example, in Europe national food safety (food standards) agencies or authorities have been established, in addition to the European Food Safety Authority (Podger, 2005), to oversee the implementation of the regulatory framework, with a specific emphasis on safety in the broadest sense.
Apart from safety, consumers are increasingly concerned about the origin of their food not only in terms of locality (region and country), but also about issues around animal welfare, environmental impact, organic production and fair trade (see Figure 1). Consumers increasingly have to make decisions about whether to purchase locally produced food versus imported products providing an all-year-round supply of, for example, fresh fruits and vegetables. The pur-chase of imported products often provides an opportunity for affluent con-sumers to support developing economies by purchasing their products. However, transporting food products over long distances (the ‘food miles’ debate) has stimulated much discussion on possible negative effects on the environment.
Consumers increasingly demand that food producers assure them that their ethical and environmental concerns are reflected in products. But, while all of the above factors play a part in putting pressures on the market for change, consumers remain very price-sensitive and seek solutions that are affordable. The need to embrace these diverse consumer concerns, yet provide foods that are affordable, places challenging constraints on the market and on the potential for innovation. Unlike all other categories of consumer products, where the consumer welcomes innovations and the application of scientific and technological developments, the outputs from science and technology with food products are often viewed with suspicion and the challenge to the industry is to communicate effectively the consumer benefits of scientific development.
Waste reduction or prevention
Reuse Recycling Waste recovery
options Composting Reduced energy
usage Life cycle analysis Reduced fat,
sugar, salt Enriched in fibre
Antioxidants Protective compounds
Lower energy density Satiety enhancing Modified functionality
Bioavailability
Consumer acceptance, safe, convenient, choice, fair trade, organic, animal welfare,
origin and provenance, price
Final product
Processing &
packaging
Raw materials & ingredients
Agricultural production
Modified agronomic practices, especially with respect to irrigation and water and soil
management
Reduced chemical inputs Improved & faster
breeding
Figure 1. Future food production and processing trends.
In both developing and developed economies, consumers’ increasing desire for choice, convenience and added value is continuing to influence the techno-logical basis of the agrifood industry. This trend also includes the increasing number of meals consumed outside the home. In addition, the marked demo-graphic changes (ageing populations) will influence the type of food required, the way it is packaged and the nutritional composition so as to contribute to healthy ageing. Increased urbanization in many developing economies will also pose challenges in relation to storage and distribution and the increased mobil-ization of different nationalities around the world will provide opportunities for even greater diversity of products to meet the different cultural needs. Changes in eating patterns from traditional diets to western-style foods and eating away from home (e.g. fast foods) will also be affected by rising incomes and the fact that more women are entering the workforce, leaving less time for food prep-aration at home.
Economic
Food security is not a new concern for countries that have battled political instability, droughts or wars. But for the first time since the early 1970s, when there were global food shortages, the issue of food availability is starting to concern more stable nations as well, especially as this will undoubtedly impact on food-price inflation (Anon., 2007f). There will be a permanent increase in demand for agricultural commodities in Asia, as the richer populations in China and India demand more protein. Demands for agricultural products from the biofuel industry, which is on course to consume about 30% of the US maize crop by 2010, will continue to have a major impact. These develop-ments will underpin prices for the medium term. FAO estimates that these structural new trends will push the cost of agricultural commodities in the next decade between 20% and 50% above their last 10-year average. This will be a problem for economies where food represents a significant share of their import payments. FAO has forecast that lower-income ‘food-deficit’ countries will spend more than US$28 billion on importing cereals in 2009, double what they spent in 2002.
Several economic-related factors will influence both which technologies are applied in the future and where they are applied. Postharvest losses of foods – physical, nutritional and in market value – are inherent to a business dealing with perishable materials. Reducing postharvest losses by controlling tempera-ture and moistempera-ture of stored grains, improved containers, packaging and cold chain maintenance of fish and horticultural perishables could, potentially, add to the global food supply and to the revenues of small farmers.
In many developing economies, there are tremendous opportunities for adding value in the country of origin of the raw materials. There is much greater opportunity for integration of the agrifood sector and the development of the organized food-processing sector in such countries. For example, new emerg-ing economies such as in China, India and Brazil are seeemerg-ing export growth of value-added products, while the value of exports as a percentage of the value
of total world exports in food and drink products in both the USA and the European Union (EU) has declined by 30% and 15%, respectively (Anon., 2007a).
Key economic issues which will continue to affect the development of organized processed food industries are cost and availability of raw materials;
labour availability and costs; rate of return on capital investment; transport costs and availability of distribution infrastructure; costs of obtaining regulatory approval for a new technology, ingredient or food; and cost of compliance with national and international regulatory frameworks.
Political
With the increased globalization of the agrifood industry, regulatory frame-works with respect to international trade have a fundamental part to play, especially with respect to food safety. The principle of equivalence in food safety has become an important issue impacting on international trade in foods (Anon., 2007c). At this level, considerable effort is being directed to achieving agreement in the concept of equivalence as it applies to food safety manage-ment systems, i.e. does the managemanage-ment of food safety in one country achieve or ensure the same level of protection as food safety management systems in a second country?
Equivalence of food safety measures is recognized in the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement) and the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT Agreement). Both agreements require member coun-tries to ensure that their food safety measures are objective, science-based, consistent and harmonized with international standards, where they exist.
Because measures can take many forms, WTO member countries are encour-aged to accept other countries’ measures and regulations as being equivalent, provided they have satisfied these alternative measures and that the regulations meet their appropriate level of protection (ALOP) or public health goals. The ALOP, which is the responsibility of national legislators, may not be the same for all countries. The WTO has recently created the SPS Information Management System (SPS IMS), a database for searching for information on WTO member governments’ sanitary and phytosanitary measures, which include food safety and animal and plant health and safety.
The Codex Alimentarius Commission (Codex), the international food standards setting body, is moving to better articulate the concept of equivalence and its application to food safety. The Codex Committee on Food Import and Export Inspection and Certification Systems (CCFICS) has developed guide-lines for the judgement and development of equivalence of sanitary measures associated with food inspection and certification systems.
For food processors and food regulation authorities, there is also the need to determine the equivalence of different food safety measures, i.e. the ability of alternative technologies to achieve the same level of health protection by, for example, destroying or inhibiting pathogenic micro-organisms. The focus
is on comparing existing approved measures, which are presumed to achieve a level of risk acceptable to the community, with alternative food safety measures.
Public policies with respect to food, diet and health will undoubtedly be a major driver for the agrifood industry in the future and will influence the need for technological development. Such policies could include intervention in relation to health claims in advertising, especially that targeted at children, and the way national governments respond to the need to resolve issues of obesity and being overweight, which is now occurring across all age and ethnic groups in both genders and across all socio-economic classes (‘globesity’) (Anon., 2007e).
Other political influences relate to public policies with respect to support of research and development and innovation or incentives to encourage industry to invest in new technologies. Similarly, policies with respect to encouraging education in science, technology and engineering will be a major influence on skilled and trained people essential for technological development. However, the commercial exploitation of new technologies will also depend on the cul-ture of entrepreneurship and risk taking within a country or in individual com-panies and the public policies which encourage enterprise.
Environmental
There will be increasing pressures on the agrifood industry both from public policies and commercial need in relation to environmental issues throughout the food supply chain. These will include the need for lower and optimized use of fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides and fungicides according to weather condi-tions, growing season and soil types.
All the predictions on the consequences of climate change suggest that water availability is set to become a key issue around the world, with the associ-ated major consequences for agricultural production and food processing. Such scarcity of water will strongly influence the use and methods of irrigation, plant breeding (e.g. drought resistance), water recycling and reuse in food production and processing systems.
Another environmental consideration that will influence development in the agrifood industry is that of waste (see Figure 1). A commonly adopted waste management hierarchy is waste reduction and prevention, reuse, recy-cling, other recovery options (including bioenergy) and, lastly, safe and envi-ronmentally sound disposal. All of these aspects will increasingly drive food production and processing systems in the future. The aim will be to develop and adopt production systems that are productive, sustainable and least bur-densome on the environment. Thus, there will be increasing pressure to reduce emissions with respect to food processing and to decrease the carbon foot-print of different systems. However, in order to target the appropriate part of the food supply chain and appropriate technologies, considerably more object-ive data from relevant life cycle analyses from farm to fork are required (Foster et al., 2006).
Technical and scientific
In addition to the above market-pull factors, technological development in the agrifood sector will also be shaped by current and future outputs from scientific and technological research and development.
For example, the desire to minimize the environmental impact of agri-culture will focus attention on the potential benefits from greater applica-tion of integrated farm management, including emphasis on integrated nutrient management, which aims to increase the use of all nutrient sources (soil resources, mineral fertilizers, organic manures, recyclable wastes and biofertilizers). Similarly, decision support systems built around knowledge of the effect of agronomic conditions on plant growth and the onset and spread of pests and disease will be increasingly used together with satellite technology to optimize the application of fertilizers and pesticides or herbi-cides on specific crops.
Another major area of science that will drive technological development is that of nutrition. Research and development will continue to provide an improved understanding of the interaction between human psychology and physiology and food and drink. Important aspects include the following:
● Understanding of food structure and its influence on human physiology and nutrition. For example, it is now recognized that particle size, the structure of the food matrix and the proportion of amylose and amylopec-tin in foods can have a significant impact on blood glucose levels when food is ingested.
● Role of food constituents and food viscosity on energy intake. Greater knowledge on satiety may well offer the possibility of providing foods which assist in lowering energy intake and associated weight control.
● Production, formulation and separation of bioactive components and the effect of processing and delivery mechanisms on bioavailability as part of a normal diet.
Developments in material sciences will continue to enable the production of new materials for packaging, with the likely emphasis to be on biodegradable and compostable materials consistent with the sustainability agenda. Other developments are likely to focus on lighter weighting, recyclability and enhance-ments to consumer use, especially responding to changing demographics and meeting the needs of an ageing population.
Continued developments in automation and robotics will enable greater integration and automation of highly value-added, large-scale processing lines.
Such developments will be enhanced by developments in vision and other non-invasive sensor systems which are integrated into feedback process control loops to ensure greater process reliability, product consistency and reduced waste or reworking of materials. Many such developments will be dependent on outputs from the basic sciences linked to the ability to store, mine and visu-alize large data sets.
As summarized in Figure 2, technologies that shape the future will have to contribute to safety and quality, especially in relation to nutrition, and
sustainability (economic, social and environmental), while being competitive and complying with an international regulatory framework as part of increas-ing international trade.