Food is one of society’s great moral quandaries. Its production pushes many species to the brink of extinction and the grazing of land that destroys ecosystems. For governments, industry, and communities to effectively balance agricultural needs with environmental needs, however, quantitative information is required. Researchers in Japan, including the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RIHN), provide such data by combining conservation priority maps with trade data across nearly 200 countries and 50 agricultural products. Their findings, as reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show which commodities have the propensity to be grown in regions with high priority for conservation and are expected to assist with policies that protect biodiversity while maintaining global food trade. The study divided areas for agriculture into four conservation priorities and correlated individual agricultural commodities to their production on land of different priority levels. The researchers found that about a third of land use occurs in areas of high conservation priority, whereas less than one quarter occurs in areas of low priority. Notably, commodities that are large staples of food consumption, such as beef, rice, and soybeans, tended to be produced in high conservation priority areas. Yet other key staples, such as barley and wheat, were frequently sourced from low priority areas.
