See Nourishing the Planet's latest powerpoint presentation at the recent Sustainable Foods Summit in San Francisco, CA. Project director Danielle Nierenberg discussed four ways that agriculture is contributing to sustainability and mitigating climate change - reducing food waste, increased involvement of youth, carbon sequestration, and urban agriculture.

1. Agriculture, the Solution
Danielle Nierenberg
Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet Project
dnierenberg@worldwatch.org
Twitter: @NourishPlanet
Facebook.com/WorldwatchAg

2. Agriculture Is the Solution
4 Innovations Making
Agriculture More Sustainable:
• Reducing Food Waste
• Involving Youth in
Agriculture
• Urban Agriculture
• Sequestering Carbon in
Soils (Photo Credit: Julie Carney / Gardens for Health International)

3. Innovation 1: Cutting Food Waste
• On average, 25 to 50
percent of a harvest is
wasted
• The global population
reached 7 billion in October
2011, making it more
important than ever to find
ways to make better use of
(Photo Credit: Randy Olson / National Geographic)
what we already produce

4. Cutting Food Waste:
Waste in the Food Chain
• Millions of tons of food is
wasted because of
negligence, especially in
industrialized countries
•In the developing world, 40
percent of food losses occur
after harvest – while food is
being stored or
transported, and during
processing and packaging
(Graphic Credit: Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2011, p. 107)

5. Cutting Food Waste:
Solar-Powered Dryers
• Solar-powered dryers are
working to preserve
mango and papaya
harvests around the world
• In Bolivia, collapsible A-
frame dryers are allowing
farmers to dry and store
crops year-round
(Photo Credit: geopathfinder.com)

6. Cutting Food Waste:
Hermetic Sealing
• Hermetically sealed bags
protect crops from
moisture, insects, and
fungus
• Researchers at Purdue
University have developed
inexpensive hermetic bags
that are being used to
protect cowpea harvests in
(Photo Credit: Purdue University)
Western Africa

7. Cutting Food Waste:
Consumer Education
• Love Food, Hate Waste is
based in the United Kingdom
• The organization has helped
divert 670,000 tons of food
from landfills
• This has saved consumers
over $970 million over the last
decade (Graphic Credit: Love Food, Hate Waste)

8. Innovation 2: Reaching the Young
• The International Labor
Organization reports that youth
unemployment around the
world rose by 4.5 million
between 2008 and 2009
• Young people need to know
that agriculture can be
intellectually stimulating and
profitable
(Photo Credit: Bernard Pollack)

9. Reaching the Young:
Developing Innovations in School Cultivation
• Developing Innovations in
School Cultivation is reigniting an
interest – and a taste for –
indigenous vegetables in Uganda
• The project introduces students (Graphic Credit: Slow Food International)
to organic farming techniques
and shows them how to make
agriculture into career
(Photo Credit: Project DISC)

10. Innovation 3: Urban Agriculture
• An estimated 14 million Africans
move to cities each year
• By 2020, 35-40 million Africans
living in cities will depend on urban
agriculture to meet their food
requirements
•By 2050, 65 percent of the world’s
(Photo Credit: Bernard Pollack)
population will live in cities.

11. Urban Agriculture and the Poor
• The poorest
urban households
practice urban
agriculture at high
rates
(Graphic Credit: Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2011, p. 112)

12. Urban Agriculture in Columbia
•Bogota is the capital of
Columbia, and home to over 7 million
people, 20 percent of whom live in
poverty.
•The Cities Farming for the Future
(CFF) Bogota program, run by the
Resource Centres on Urban
Agriculture and Food Security Photo credits: Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security
(RUAF), is spreading an innovative
garden design that works on hard
ground, such as rooftops and patios.
•It is also helping to combine food
security and scientific research by
partnering with the Botanical Garden
of Bogota.

13. Urban Agriculture: Kibera (Nairobi, Kenya)
(Photo Credits: Bernard Pollack)

14. Innovation 4: Carbon Storing
• 50 billion tons of
carbon can be
sequestered over
the next 50 years
(Photo Credit: Bernard Pollack)

15. Farm or Forest?
(Photo Credit: World Agroforestry Centre)
(It’s Both!)

16. Moving Forward
• It’s time for agriculture
to become a solution for
global problems
• Done right, farming can
strengthen
communities, nourish
families, and protect the
earth
(Photo Credit: Raïsa Mirza)

17. Danielle Nierenberg
Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet Project
dnierenberg@worldwatch.org
Twitter: @NourishPlanet
Facebook.com/WorldwatchAg