This Data Science Insights talk hosted by Thomson Reuters sees presentations from Professor Nilay Shah from Imperial College, Judith Batchelar, Director of Brand at UK supermarket chain Sainsbury’s, and Derek Scuffell, Head of R&D Information Systems at Syngenta, who share insights on how their supply chains are driven by data.  They discuss how advances in genetically modified foods and in agricultural technology could help prevent food shortages and price fluctuations and help the world feed itself by 2025.

This summary has been provided by FCRN member Alessandro Cerutti from the European Commission Joint Research Centre (JRC). Public administrations such as schools, hospitals and other sectors are well aware of the effort required to manage all the stages of the catering service, from menu selection through to waste management. Several strategies hold potential to reduce the environmental impacts throughout these stages, especially in the context of the Green Public Procurement (GPP). Unfortunately, despite the best of intentions, budget constraints are constantly forcing managers to make difficult trade-offs.

Public Health England(PHE) has published new guidelines setting out the approaches the food industry should take to reduce the net amount of sugar children consume through everyday food. 

This report authored by By Tim Lang, Professor of Food Policy at University of London was commissioned for Friends of the Earth. It outlines the current state of policy thinking on sustainable diets and reviews some national, international and local attempts to chart new policy directions to tackle growing evidence that food consumption has immense impact on environment, health, society and economy.

In this Nature commentary Jess Davies from Lancaster Environment Centre discusses the urgent need to deal with the degradation of our soils, focusing on the need for the private sector to take this sustainability threat seriously by taking action on soil. Today one-third of all soils and more than half of agricultural soils are moderately or highly degraded.

This report details the methodology used to create a new online tool which can help companies set science-based emission targets and incorporate land-use change into their mitigation strategies. It is part of the Science Based Targets initiative run by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) CDP, UN Global Compact, the World Resources Institute (WRI) and World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

A new technology using a harmless laser beam can replace stickers on fresh food produce with a direct marking on the skin of a piece of fruit or vegetable. Named ‘Natural Branding’, the innovation could result in significant savings in sticker use as well as packaging. Nature and More, a Dutch organic food exporter, in collaboration with Swedish supermarket ICA is now using the branding on organic avocados and sweet potatoes.

A new patent by Nestlé scientists promises a reduction in sugar content in their chocolate and confectionary within years. 

The Nexus2020 project has published a report in which academics and business leaders worked together to identify the most important questions around sustainability for businesses. It specifically focuses on so-called ‘nexus’ issues: the interconnections between food, water, energy and the natural environment.