̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Cambridge Global Food Security Interdisciplinary Research Centre

Snakes in potted olive trees ‘tip of the iceberg’ of ornamental plant trade hazards

jg533 — Fri, 17 Jan 2025 10:44:12 +0000

Invasive pests are slipping unnoticed into northern Europe in huge shipments of cut flowers and potted plants, say researchers, with potential to damage food crops and the natural environment

Early warning tool will help control huge locust swarms

jg533 — Thu, 19 Dec 2024 19:00:34 +0000

Desert locusts typically lead solitary lives until something - like intense rainfall - triggers them to swarm in vast numbers, often with devastating consequences.

This migratory pest can reach plague proportions, and a swarm covering one square kilometre can consume enough food in one day to feed 35,000 people. Such extensive crop destruction pushes up local food prices and can lead to riots and mass starvation.

Now a team led by the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge has developed a way to predict when and where desert locusts will swarm, so they can be dealt with before the problem gets out of hand.

It uses weather forecast data from the UK Met Office, and state-of the-art computational models of the insects’ movements in the air, to predict where swarms will go as they search for new feeding and breeding grounds. ̽��ֱ��areas likely to be affected can then be sprayed with pesticides.

Until now, predicting and controlling locust swarms has been ‘hit and miss’, according to the researchers. Their new model, published today in the journal PLOS Computational Biology, will enable national agencies to respond quickly to a developing locust threat.

Desert locust control is a top priority for food security: it is the biggest migratory pest for smallholder farmers in many regions of Africa and Asia, and capable of long-distance travel across national boundaries.

Climate change is expected to drive more frequent desert locust swarms, by causing trigger events like cyclones and intense rainfall. These bring moisture to desert regions that allows plants to thrive, providing food for locusts that triggers their breeding.

“During a desert locust outbreak we can now predict where swarms will go several days in advance, so we can control them at particular sites. And if they’re not controlled at those sites, we can predict where they’ll go next so preparations can be made there,” said Dr Renata Retkute, a researcher in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences and first author of the paper.

“ ̽��ֱ��important thing is to respond quickly if there’s likely to be a big locust upsurge, before it causes a major crop loss. Huge swarms can lead to really desperate situations where people could starve,” said Professor Chris Gilligan in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Plant Sciences, senior author of the paper.

He added: “Our model will allow us to hit the ground running in future, rather than starting from scratch as has historically been the case.”

̽��ֱ��team noticed the need for a comprehensive model of desert locust behaviour during the response to a massive upsurge over 2019-2021, which extended from Kenya to India and put huge strain on wheat production in these regions. ̽��ֱ��infestations destroyed sugarcane, sorghum, maize and root crops. ̽��ֱ��researchers say the scientific response was hampered by the need to gather and integrate information from a range of disparate sources.

“ ̽��ֱ��response to the last locust upsurge was very ad-hoc, and less efficient than it could have been. We’ve created a comprehensive model that can be used next time to control this devastating pest,” said Retkute.

Although models like this have been attempted before, this is the first that can rapidly and reliably predict swarm behaviour. It takes into account the insects’ lifecycle and their selection of breeding sites, and can forecast locust swarm movements both short and long-term.

̽��ֱ��new model has been rigorously tested using real surveillance and weather data from the last major locust upsurge. It will inform surveillance, early warning, and management of desert locust swarms by national governments, and international organisations like the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO).

̽��ֱ��researchers say countries that haven’t experienced a locust upsurge in many years are often ill-prepared to respond, lacking the necessary surveillance teams, aircraft and pesticides. As climate change alters the movement and spread of major swarms, better planning is needed - making the new model a timely development.

̽��ֱ��project involved collaborators at the FAO and the UK Met Office. It was funded by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Reference: Retkute, R, et al: ‘A framework for modelling desert locust population dynamics and large-scale dispersal.’ PLOS Computational Biology, December 2024. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012562

A new tool that predicts the behaviour of desert locust populations will help national agencies to manage huge swarms before they devastate food crops in Africa and Asia.

̽��ֱ��response to the last locust upsurge was very ad-hoc, and less efficient than it could have been. We’ve created a comprehensive model that can be used next time to control this devastating pest.

Renata Retkute

Keith Cressman, FAO

Locust swarm fills the skies in Ethiopia

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Licence type:

Attribution-Noncommerical

Are weight loss jabs the solution to the obesity crisis?

jg533 — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 10:50:43 +0000

Almost two thirds of UK adults are overweight or obese. Are weight loss drugs the solution? Cambridge experts share their opinions.

Pork labelling schemes ‘not helpful’ in making informed buying choices, say researchers

jg533 — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 09:27:35 +0000

Researchers have evaluated different types of pig farming – including woodland, organic, free range, RSPCA assured, and Red Tractor certified, to assess each systems’ impact across four areas: land use (representing biodiversity loss), greenhouse gas emissions, antibiotics use and animal welfare. Their study concludes that none of the farm types performed consistently well across all four areas – a finding that has important implications for increasingly climate conscious consumers, as well as farmers themselves.

However, there were individual farms that did perform well in all domains, including an indoor Red Tractor farm, an outdoor bred, indoor finished RSPCA assured farm and fully outdoor woodland farm. “Outliers like these show that trade-offs are not inevitable,” said lead author Dr Harriet Bartlett, Research Associate at the ̽��ֱ�� of Oxford's Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, who was formerly at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

“Somewhat unexpectedly we found that a handful of farms perform far better than average across all four of our environmental and welfare measures,” added senior author Andrew Balmford, Professor of Conservation Science at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge. However, none of the current label or assurance schemes predicted which farms these would be.

“ ̽��ֱ��way we classify farm types and label pork isn’t helpful for making informed decisions when it comes to buying more sustainable meat. Even more importantly, we aren’t rewarding and incentivising the best-performing farmers. Instead of focusing on farm types or practices, we need to focus on meaningful outcomes for people, the planet and the pigs – and assess, and reward farms based on these,” said Bartlett.

̽��ֱ��findings also show that common assumptions around food labelling can be misplaced. For instance, Organic farming systems, which consumers might see as climate and environmentally friendly, have on average three times the CO2 output per kg of meat of more intensive Red Tractor or RSPCA assured systems and four times the land use. However, these same systems use on average almost 90% fewer antibiotic medicines, and result in improved animal welfare compared with production from Red tractor or RSPCA assured systems.

̽��ֱ��way we classify livestock farms must be improved, Bartlett says, because livestock production is growing rapidly, especially pork production, which has quadrupled in the past 50 years and already accounts for 9% of greenhouse gas emissions from livestock. Pig farming also uses more antibiotics than any other livestock sector, and 8.5% of all arable land.

“Our findings show that mitigating the environmental impacts of livestock farming isn’t a case of saying which farm type is the best,” said Bartlett. “There is substantial scope for improvement within types, and our current means of classification is not identifying the best farms for the planet and animals overall. Instead, we need to identify farms that successfully limit their impacts across all areas of societal concern, and understand, promote and incentivise their practises.”

̽��ֱ��study reached its conclusions using data from 74 UK and 17 Brazilian breed-to-finish systems, each made up of 1-3 farms and representing the annual production of over 1.2 million pigs. It is published today in the journal Nature Food.

“To the best of our knowledge, our dataset covers by far the largest and most diverse sample of pig production systems examined in any single study,” said Bartlett.

James Wood, Professor of Equine and Farm Animal Science at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, commented: “This important study identifies a key need to clarify what different farm labels should indicate to consumers; there is a pressing need to extend this work into other farming sectors. It also clearly demonstrates the critical importance that individual farmers play in promoting best practice across all farming systems.”

Trade-offs in the externalities of pig production are not inevitable was authored by academics at the ̽��ֱ�� of Oxford, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and the ̽��ֱ�� of São Paulo.

̽��ֱ��research was funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).

Reference: Bartlett, H.,‘Trade-offs in the externalities of pig production are not inevitable.’ Nature Food, April 2024. DOI: 10.1038/s43016-024-00921-2

Adapted from a press release by the ̽��ֱ�� of Oxford.

Farmers don’t have to choose between lowering environmental impact and improving welfare for their pigs, a new study has found: it is possible to do both. But this is not reflected in the current food labelling schemes relied on by consumers.

̽��ֱ��way we classify farm types and label pork isn’t helpful for making informed decisions when it comes to buying more sustainable meat.

Harriet Bartlett

Charity Burggraaf/ Getty

Two pigs on a farm

Yes

Licence type:

Attribution-Noncommerical

Fish bellies, fava beans and food security

plc32 — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 15:20:27 +0000

Cambridge Zero and Cambridge Global Food Security gather academics and experts to share solutions for the planet’s looming food production problem.

Farm to factories

plc32 — Fri, 15 Mar 2024 16:51:02 +0000

Cambridge Zero collaborates with Cambridge Global Food Security Interdisciplinary Research Centre (IRC) and the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Decarbonisation Network for two research events in March 2024 that look at industry decarbonisation and food security.

A habitable planet for healthy humans

plc32 — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 17:28:42 +0000

Cambridge Zero symposium gathers researchers to examine the connections between planetary and public health.

Carbon-omics and global health

plc32 — Fri, 17 Nov 2023 12:05:53 +0000

Cambridge Zero to host two research symposia to discuss critical climate change challenges