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Indian agriculture is expected to feed a growing and increasingly urbanised population. But if everyone wants to move to towns and cities, who is left to farm the land?

̽»¨Ö±²¥amount of antimicrobials given to animals destined for human consumption is expected to rise by a staggering 52% and reach 200,000 tonnes by 2030 unless policies are implemented to limit their use, according to new research. 

What was life in the fens like in the period known as the dark ages?  Archaeologist Susan Oosthuizen revisits the history of an iconic wetland in the light of fresh evidence and paints a compelling portrait of communities in tune with their changeable environment. In doing so, she makes an important contribution to a wider understanding of early medieval landscapes.

Excavation of a site in the Cambridgeshire fens reveals a Bronze Age settlement with connections far beyond its watery location. Over the past ten months, Must Farm has yielded Britain’s largest collections of Bronze Age textiles, beads and domestic artefacts. Together with timbers of several roundhouses, the finds provide a stunning snapshot of a community thriving 3,000 years ago.

Increased farm yields could help to spare land from agriculture for natural habitats that benefit wildlife and store greenhouse gases, but only if the right policies are in place. Conservation scientists call on policymakers to learn from working examples across the globe and find better ways to protect habitats while producing food on less land.

Analysis of grinding stones reveals that North African communities may have moved slowly and cautiously from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to more settled farming practices. Newly published research by Cambridge archaeologist Dr Giulio Lucarini suggests that a preference for wild crops was a strategic decision.

New study using UK data is first to show that raising farm yields and allowing ‘spared’ land to be reclaimed for woodlands and wetlands could offset greenhouse gas produced by farming industry to meet national target of 80% emissions reduction by 2050.

New research shows a cereal familiar today as birdseed was carried across Eurasia by ancient shepherds and herders laying the foundation, in combination with the new crops they encountered, of ‘multi-crop’ agriculture and the rise of settled societies. Archaeologists say ‘forgotten’ millet has a role to play in modern crop diversity and today’s food security debate.

New research suggests that feeding our food waste, or swill, to pigs (currently banned under EU law) could save 1.8 million hectares of global agricultural land – an area roughly half the size of Switzerland, including hundreds of thousands of acres of South America’s biodiverse forests and savannahs – and provide a use for the 100 million tonnes of food wasted in the EU each year.

°Õ³ó±ðÌýCambridge Animal Alphabet series celebrates Cambridge's connections with animals through literature, art, science and society. Here, S is for Sheep and their presence in the evocative, pastoral paintings by Samuel Palmer.