On a day-to-day, local level, it can be all too easy to forget the perilous state that our planet is in – but the sobering reality checks from science are only getting more frequent and more serious.
Now an international team of researchers, under the auspices of the Food Systems Countdown Initiative (FSCI), has looked at how humanity is doing at meeting its internationally agreed food system goals for 2030.
There’s bad news: we’re not on track. In fact, we’re very off track.
In an FSCI report published in Nature Food, the researchers assessed 44 indicators. Of the 30 with defined global targets, only one is realistically within reach by 2030: mobile phone subscriptions, used as a proxy to assess social connectedness and food system resilience.
The report’s approach combines progress toward targets agreed by governments and international bodies, with benchmarks between countries, to provide a fuller picture of what’s achievable and what isn’t.
“What makes this Countdown paper different is that it doesn’t just tell countries whether they’re moving in the right direction – it tells them how far they still have to go, and against a benchmark that’s actually within reach,” says nutrition scientist Bianca Carducci, from the Columbia Climate School in the US.
“That distinction between tracking trends and measuring performance is what turns a monitoring exercise into a tool for accountability.”
The indicators measured by the researchers cover broad aspects of food systems, including how that food is produced, transported, and consumed. Everything from natural resource depletion to dietary habits can influence how strong or weak a food system is.
frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen>And these targets and benchmarks are important – without them, and nothing to gauge progress with, we risk a dangerous lack of accountability and collective impetus.
One indicator category theme is governance, which highlights this specifically.
“Food systems transformation is a shared responsibility,” says Lawrence Haddad, Executive Director at the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition in Switzerland.
“The governance indicators, including government effectiveness, accountability, and civil society participation, are not just one category among five. They are the enablers. Improving them unlocks progress across the entire system.”
For 22 of the indicators, fewer than a third of the 197 countries included in the report are set to meet the applicable global target or benchmark by 2030.
One of the worst-performing indicators is ‘greenhouse gas emissions from food systems’, with the global average more than 75 percent away from the target.
Some indicators are actually going in the wrong direction, including civil society participation, government accountability, pesticide use, and ultra-processed food sales.
When using regional or income-group benchmarks, where countries are compared against similar nations in terms of development and economy, the gaps to those benchmarks are generally smaller – but substantial gaps remain for many indicators.
“Bold global targets are vital for inspiring ambition. But they can become a source of inertia if they seem permanently out of reach,” says food policy scientist Jessica Fanzo, from Johns Hopkins University.
“Therefore, regional and income-group benchmarks keep progress within sight and help identify the exemplar countries that can show others how it is achievable.”
The report also offers some brighter news. For 7 of 33 indicators with relevant projection data, at least a third of countries are on track for 2030, while half the indicators are moving in the right direction.
The outlook “improves considerably” when the researchers extend the assessment horizon to 2050, although some targets remain extremely difficult to reach.
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Big changes are needed, and fast, to improve food affordability, food security, resilience and other areas where countries remain far from their targets – with vulnerable populations facing particularly high risks from environmental and food-system shocks.
“Accountability for food systems transformation requires accelerated progress — without it, efforts risk becoming performative rather than transformative,” says sustainability scientist Mario Herrero, from the Ashley School of Global Development and the Environment.
“We can no longer afford to continue at the present pace.”
The research has been published in Nature Food.
This article was fact-checked by Rebecca Dyer and edited by Rebecca Dyer. While we pride ourselves on our process, we are only human. If you spot a mistake, please let us know.
