Consumer demand for meat in Finland

Vaikka kasvisten ja vaihtoehtoisten proteiinilähteiden arvellaan vähentävän lihatuotteiden suosiota, kasvava lihan kulutus ei näytä saavuttaneen lakipistettään. Terveysongelmien lisäksi korkea lihakulutustaso nähdään biodiversiteettiä heikentävänä ja kasvihuonekaasuja tuottavana ympäristön rasittajana. Kulutuksessa tapahtuviin muutoksiin ja muutosten aiheuttamiin vaikutuksiin ei voida reagoida tehokkaasti ellei kulutukseen vaikuttavia taustatekijöitä tunneta. Tässä tutkimuksessa lihan kysyntää, ja siihen vaikuttavia tekijöitä analysoitiin ekonometristen menetelmien avulla. Lihatuotteet jaoteltiin ryhmiin (nauta ja lammas, sianliha, siipikarjanliha, prosessoitu liha, muut lihatuotteet) ja aineistona käytettiin Tilastokeskuksen kulutustutkimus-aineistoja vuosilta 1998, 2006 ja 2012. Tutkielman päätuotoksena ovat kysynnän hinta- ja menojoustot, jotka estimoitiin sensoroidun lineaarisen moniyhtälömallin (LA-AIDS) avulla. Joustot kertovat kuinka herkkiä eri lihatuotteet ovat hintavaihteluille ja paljastavat ryhmien välisiä tulo- ja substituutiovaikutuksia. Lisäksi tutkimustulokset kertoivat, kuinka sosio-ekonomiset muuttujat kuten tulotaso, koulutus ja ikääntyminen vaikuttavat kunkin liharyhmän kulutukseen. Kulutus ohjaa koko ruokaketjun toimintaa; tuotantoa, tuontia ja vientiä. Jatkotutkimuksen tarvetta ja vastaavanlaisen analyysin laajentamista muille elintarvikesektoreille korostetaan.This paper focuses on meat consumption patterns in Finland. Empirical analysis for this paper was based on the micro data of three Household Budget Surveys: 1998, 2006 and 2012. A censored linear approximation of the almost ideal demand system (LA-AIDS) model was employed in the study. The major outcomes of the study were the demand expenditure and price elasticities that were obtained from the parameter estimates of five different meat products. Since the data lacked price information, unit values were used as a price substitutes, which gave some insights into quality-quantity upgrading. According to the results, pork expenditure was elastic and thus was luxury good during the study period, whereas ruminant meat and poultry were luxuries only in 2000s. In addition, the price of a good, household size, and income had a large influence on meat consumption. Additionally, other factors (such as age) affected the portion of the budget that was allocated to meat products. In order to obtain more information relating to the food sector, further research concerning disaggregate demand would be needed

Food system by-products upcycled in livestock and aquaculture feeds can increase global food supply

Optimizing biomass use by reducing food-feed competition is paramount to achieving sustainable food systems. This study assesses global food systems in terms of livestock and aquaculture feed use and the availability of food system by-products and residues to quantify the potential for replacing food-grade feeds with food system by-products. Many livestock and aquaculture feeds compete for resources with food production. Increasing the use of food system by-products and residues as feed could reduce this competition. We gathered data on global food system material flows for crop, livestock and aquaculture production, focusing on feed use and the availability of by-products and residues. We then analysed the potential of replacing food-competing feedstuff-here cereals, whole fish, vegetable oils and pulses that account for 15% of total feed use-with food system by-products and residues. Considering the nutritional requirements of food-producing animals, including farmed aquatic species, this replacement could increase the current global food supply by up to 13% (10-16%) in terms of kcal and 15% (12-19%) in terms of protein content. Increasing the use of food system by-products as feed has considerable potential, particularly when combined with other measures, in the much-needed transition towards circular food systems.Peer reviewe

Quantifying Earth system interactions for sustainable food production via expert elicitation

Several safe boundaries of critical Earth system processes have already been crossed due to human perturbations; not accounting for their interactions may further narrow the safe operating space for humanity. Using expert knowledge elicitation, we explored interactions among seven variables representing Earth system processes relevant to food production, identifying many interactions little explored in Earth system literature. We found that green water and land system change affect other Earth system processes strongly, while land, freshwater and ocean components of biosphere integrity are the most impacted by other Earth system processes, most notably blue water and biogeochemical flows. We also mapped a complex network of mechanisms mediating these interactions and created a future research prioritization scheme based on interaction strengths and existing knowledge gaps. Our study improves the understanding of Earth system interactions, with sustainability implications including improved Earth system modelling and more explicit biophysical limits for future food production

Elintarvikkeiden hintamarginaalit

201

Socioeconomic factors of global food loss

| openaire: EC/H2020/819202/EU//SOS.aquaterra Funding Information: This study was funded by the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (SOS.aquaterra; grant agreement no. 819202) and by the Academy of Finland (TREFORM; Grant No. 339834). Publisher Copyright: © 2023, The Author(s).A considerable amount of food produced is lost globally. Food loss indicates not only the amount of edible food that humans do not consume but also the waste of resources used in production and distribution, linked with multifold problems such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and economic loss. While there has been a growing body of literature about magnitudes and technical solutions to reduce food loss, little is known about how different socioeconomic factors are potentially related to the losses. Here we assess the relationships between various relevant socioeconomic factors and food loss within the early stages of the food supply chain (i.e., farm, harvest, storage, and transport parts of it) using the most comprehensive data available. We found that factors such as high gross national income (GNI) per capita and high employment in agriculture are significantly associated with low food loss. It suggests that income might be invested in technology or infrastructure while labor is still vital to reducefood loss, especially in technology-inferior countries. Other important factors related to low food loss are access to electricity in rural areas and export volume index, although the significance and directions vary in each commodity and food supply stage. Our results provide valuable insights into socioeconomic factors around food loss that are beneficial to formulating relevant policy, especially in countries where substantial food losses in the early stages of the food supply chain considerably risk to food security.Peer reviewe

Suomalaisen maitosektorin rakenteet ja niiden muutokset vuosina 1995–2018

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Importance of trade dependencies for agricultural inputs : a case study of Finland

| openaire: EC/H2020/819202/EU//SOS.aquaterraApproximately 80% of the world's population lives in countries that are dependent on food imports to sustain an adequate food supply. Besides these food imports, further dependencies also arise due to the requirements for agricultural inputs, including energy, fertilisers, feed and agricultural machinery. While the trade of agricultural inputs is relatively well represented in economic analysis, the quantification is often in terms of monetary values, and thus the assessments of the actual input quantities are very limited. In this paper, we develop a framework for analysis of the traded input quantities at the country-level and demonstrate its utility through an in-depth analysis of Finland's dependency on agricultural inputs. Further, we assess the importance of these inputs for domestic food production from a resilience perspective. We find that Finland, a country with relatively high food self-sufficiency but also a great dependency on imported agricultural inputs, experienced an increase in its dependency over the period 1996-2016. In case of trading partners, the story is more mixed: while trading partners for soybeans increased, those decreased in case of electricity while no significant change was observed in other commodities. In Finland, the rapeseed dependency on imports (ratio of net imports and consumption) grew from around 0% to almost 50% between the years 1987-2013. Changes for electricity remained substantially smaller, with dependency only slightly growing during the study period. Crude oil and soybean supplies are totally dependent on imports as neither is produced in Finland. Interestingly, the highest dependencies for agricultural inputs were on different countries than that for foodstuff imports. Thus, when identifying and assessing approaches to increase resilience to trade-related shocks, it is essential to understand both foodstuff and agricultural input dependencies within the global food system.Peer reviewe

Global trends in grassland carrying capacity and relative stocking density of livestock

| openaire: EC/H2020/819202/EU//SOS.aquaterra Funding Information: The work was funded by ‐ , the Academy of Finland funded projects WATVUL (grant No. 317320) and TREFORM (grant no. 339834), and the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 819202). MH would like to acknowledge support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation MERLIN grant (INV023682). Maa ja vesitekniikan tuki ry Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The Authors. Global Change Biology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.Although the role of livestock in future food systems is debated, animal proteins are unlikely to completely disappear from our diet. Grasslands are a key source of primary productivity for livestock, and feed-food competition is often limited on such land. Previous research on the potential for sustainable grazing has focused on restricted geographical areas or does not consider inter-annual changes in grazing opportunities. Here, we developed a robust method to estimate trends and interannual variability (IV) in global livestock carrying capacity (number of grazing animals a piece of land can support) over 2001–2015, as well as relative stocking density (the reported livestock distribution relative to the estimated carrying capacity [CC]) in 2010. We first estimated the aboveground biomass that is available for grazers on global grasslands based on the MODIS Net Primary Production product. This was then used to calculate livestock carrying capacities using slopes, forest cover, and animal forage requirements as restrictions. We found that globally, CC decreased on 27% of total grasslands area, mostly in Europe and southeastern Brazil, while it increased on 15% of grasslands, particularly in Sudano-Sahel and some parts of South America. In 2010, livestock forage requirements exceeded forage availability in northwestern Europe, and southern and eastern Asia. Although our findings imply some opportunities to increase grazing pressures in cold regions, Central Africa, and Australia, the high IV or low biomass supply might prevent considerable increases in stocking densities. The approach and derived open access data sets can feed into global food system modelling, support conservation efforts to reduce land degradation associated with overgrazing, and help identify undergrazed areas for targeted sustainable intensification efforts or rewilding purposes.Peer reviewe

Quantifying Earth system interactions for sustainable food production via expert elicitation

Several safe boundaries of critical Earth system processes have already been crossed due to human perturbations; not accounting for their interactions may further narrow the safe operating space for humanity. Using expert knowledge elicitation, we explored interactions among seven variables representing Earth system processes relevant to food production, identifying many interactions little explored in Earth system literature. We found that green water and land system change affect other Earth system processes strongly, while land, freshwater and ocean components of biosphere integrity are the most impacted by other Earth system processes, most notably blue water and biogeochemical flows. We also mapped a complex network of mechanisms mediating these interactions and created a future research prioritization scheme based on interaction strengths and existing knowledge gaps. Our study improves the understanding of Earth system interactions, with sustainability implications including improved Earth system modelling and more explicit biophysical limits for future food production.Water Resource