More people went hungry in Africa in 2017. But new initiatives also bore fruit The number of people experiencing food insecurity in Africa rose from 220 million people to 224 million people this year. The Food and Agriculture Organisation’s regional overview for the year attributes this to changing weather patterns that led to poor harvests, a loss of livestock, conflict and recurrent droughts. Food security occurs when all people, at all times, have access to enough food to meet their dietary needs. $2.4M fund to develop products from bio-based feedstocks Thanks to a $1.09 million grant from the Michigan Strategic Fund, plus matching funds from Michigan State University (MSU), several bio-based MSU research projects will be fast-tracked for commercial development over the next three years. MSU recently received the funding from the Michigan Translational Research and Commercialization (“M-TRAC”) program as part of a state-wide initiative to invest in research areas that have shown promise in the laboratory, but need further development in order to become successful in a competitive market. With MSU’s matching funds, a total of $2.44 million will be focused on MSU biotechnology and bioprocessing innovations that have the potential to create superior value-added products and materials from agricultural-based feedstocks, such as: “The bio-based chemical industry is expected to grow to more than $450 billion by 2025,” says Richard Chylla, executive director of MSU Technologies.
What Foods Kids Eat Around the World in Photos What Kids Eat Around the World In the face of rising global obesity, photographer Gregg Segal traveled around the world to ask kids what they eat in one week and then photographed them alongside the food. Photographs and text by Gregg Segal In an 8×8 aluminum hut on a construction site outside Mumbai, Anchal Sahni sits down to dinner with her family: homemade aloo bhindo (okra and potatoes simmered in curry) and chapati (flatbread) with a side of lentils. HB2 Bromine Precursor – A New Antimicrobial Intervention - Birko Food Processing Plant Cleaning Chemicals, Sanitation Chemicals and Delivery Equipment Controlled lab tests have shown that hypobromous acid (generated from Enviro Tech’s liquid HB2 precursor) is effective in reducing E. coli O157:H7 and other problem pathogens by as much as 99.959% in a one-minute period and up to 99.999% over five minutes.This compares favorably with other popular antimicrobial interventions in current use. HB2 offers specific advantages over other sources of hypobromous acid in cost, ease of application and safety. This all-liquid source of hypobromous acid offers significant advantages over the other source of hypobromous acid, DBDMH. Enviro Tech received FDA FCN (Food Contact Notification) 000944 for use of hybobromous acid from HB2 and has received GRAS (Generally Regarded As Safe) notification for use in meat plants. It is listed in 7120.1 R2 and may be used as intervention on red meat and poultry in USDA-inspected plants.
First ever global scientific eating plan forgets the world's poor The team warns that the way we eat now threatens both our health and the long-term survival of the planet. They say the current food system dangerously overproduces greenhouse gases, misuses fertiliser, and causes large-scale food wastage and massive land degradation. Their solution is to shift to a diet that transforms this damaging food system. This diet would sustainably feed up to 10 billion people by 2050 and avert about 11 million premature adult deaths a year due to cardiovascular disease and other non-communicable diseases. World of Food Science: Volume 14 - Education Volume 14: Education in Food Science and Technology This issue of The World of Food Science provides a brief synopsis of some aspects of food science and technology education discussed at the 16th World Congress of Food Science and Technology held at Iguazzu Falls, Brazil in August 2012: EC’s Trackfast Project: Training Requirements and Careers…European Food Science and Technology EducationIUFoST Guidelines for Curricula in Food ScienceFood S&T Undergraduate and Graduate Curricula in Canada and the USAFood S&T Curricula in Africa: Meeting Africa’s New Challenges…IUFoST Activities in Distance Education. Commencing in this volume on Education are three short introductions to aspects of food drying prepared by Don Mercer, University of Guelph, Canada as part of a series of community education activities for his local area. More will follow in future volumes:
Eight ways to halt a global food crisis There are serious challenges to global food supply everywhere we look. Intensive use of fertilisers in the US Midwest is causing nutrients to run off into rivers and streams, degrading the water quality and causing a Connecticut-size dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Chocolate production will soon be challenged in West Africa – home to over half of global production. A variety of nutritional impacts are predicted due to increased atmospheric carbon dioxide – including decreased protein content in food, which has a potential to exacerbate malnutrition.
Why a Stick of Chewing Gum is More Harmful To Your Health Than Anything You Eat People do not typically ingest gum, so they pay very little attention to its ingredients. The assumption is that if the gum is not swallowed, then the ingredients should not be a concern. However, the ingredients in gum travel into the blood stream faster and in higher concentrations than food ingredients, because they absorb directly through the walls of the mouth, and these ingredients do not undergo the normal filtration process of digestion. Gum is typically the most toxic product in supermarkets that is intended for internal use, and it is likely to kill any pet that eats it. Commercial gum products contain roughly the same list of toxic ingredients, with differing labeling, which is virtually always designed to mislead. Common Ingredients of Gum
Tell Congress to Stop the Corporate Farm Bill Boondoggle! Every 5 years, Congress passes a Food and Farm bill that dictates food and agriculture policy for decades to come. This is the single most important piece of legislation that determines what Americans, and many people around the world, eat on a daily basis. Today, voting on vital improvements to the House Farm Bill! It's your turn to decide who benefits this time around: You or corporate lobbyists? This year, the House Ag Committee has called for $20.5 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), literally stealing food from the hungriest, most needy children and less fortunate while piling up giant agribusiness handouts left and right to factory farms and America's wealthiest GMO farmers.
When it comes to food, technology won’t save us Despite what Monsanto and a surprising number of science writers want you to think, GMOs aren’t the only high-tech game in town when it comes to food and agriculture. In fact, there are groups out there that are marrying technology and food that aren’t about inserting bacterial genes into plants and animals. One such group, the New York City-based company Food + Tech Connect, held its second annual Hack/Meat brainstorming/tinkering session last weekend. FAQs: The Safety of Food Containers Made with Polycarbonate Plastic » en español Polycarbonate plastic has been studied and tested for nearly 50 years, and its use in products that come in contact with food is regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as well as governmental bodies worldwide. A raw material used in polycarbonate plastics, bisphenol A (BPA), has been the subject of news reports questioning its safety. Extensive safety data on BPA show that polycarbonate plastic can be used safely in consumer products.
The Safety of Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) » en español For more than 100 years, plastic products have revolutionized the way we live. Polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, is a particularly notable example. The Safety of Beverages in Plastic Bottles BEVERAGES | April/May 2009 By Jill Culora With bisphenol A (BPA) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) consistently in the mass media with regard to beverage packaging, beverage processors must manage the vast amount of misinformation that abounds and maintain strict standards of beverage safety. While cognizant of consumer concerns, beverage manufacturers must insist on transparency and continue to reassure consumers about product safety.