Since 2009, the world has been stuck on a single narrative around a coming global food crisis and what we need to do to avoid it. How do we feed nine billion people by 2050? Every conference, podcast and dialogue around global food security starts with this question and goes on to answer it by saying we need to produce 70 percent more food.
Od 2009. u svijetu se ponavlja jedna te ista priča o nadolazećoj globalnoj prehrambenoj krizi i o tome što učiniti kako bi se ona izbjegla. Kako nahraniti devet milijardi ljudi do 2050.? Svaka konferencija, podcast i razgovor o globalnoj sigurnosti opskrbe hranom počinje tim pitanjem i nastavlja se odgovorom da je potrebno proizvoditi 70% više hrane.
The 2050 narrative started to evolve shortly after global food prices hit all-time highs in 2008. People were suffering and struggling, governments and world leaders needed to show us that they were paying attention and were working to solve it. The thing is, 2050 is so far into the future that we can't even relate to it, and more importantly, if we keep doing what we're doing, it's going to hit us a lot sooner than that.
Priča o 2050. počela se razvijati ubrzo nakon što su globalne cijene hrane dosegle rekordne visine 2008. godine. Ljudi su patili i borili se, a vlade i svjetski čelnici trebali su nam pokazati da prate što se događa i rade na pronalasku rješenja. Stvar je u tome da je 2050. toliko daleko da je ne možemo ni zamisliti, a još je važnije da će nas, ako nastavimo kao dosad, sustići i mnogo ranije.
I believe we need to ask a different question. The answer to that question needs to be framed differently. If we can reframe the old narrative and replace it with new numbers that tell us a more complete pictures, numbers that everyone can understand and relate to, we can avoid the crisis altogether.
Mislim da si moramo postaviti drukčije pitanje. Odgovor na to pitanje mora se drukčije formulirati. Ako staru priču drukčije formuliramo i zamijenimo je novim brojkama, koje nam daju puniju sliku, brojkama koje svi mogu razumijeti i predočiti si, onda krizu možemo posve izbjeći.
I was a commodities trader in my past life and one of the things that I learned trading is that every market has a tipping point, the point at which change occurs so rapidly that it impacts the world and things change forever. Think of the last financial crisis, or the dot-com crash.
U prošlosti sam se bavila trgovinom i pritom sam naučila i to da svako tržište ima svoju prijelomnu točku, točku pri kojoj do promjene dolazi toliko brzo da ona utječe na cijeli svijet te se stvari zauvijek promijene. Sjetite se zadnje financijske krize, ili "dot-com" kraha.
So here's my concern. We could have a tipping point in global food and agriculture if surging demand surpasses the agricultural system's structural capacity to produce food. This means at this point supply can no longer keep up with demand despite exploding prices, unless we can commit to some type of structural change. This time around, it won't be about stock markets and money. It's about people. People could starve and governments may fall. This question of at what point does supply struggle to keep up with surging demand is one that started off as an interest for me while I was trading and became an absolute obsession. It went from interest to obsession when I realized through my research how broken the system was and how very little data was being used to make such critical decisions. That's the point I decided to walk away from a career on Wall Street and start an entrepreneurial journey to start Gro Intelligence.
Evo što me brine. Do prijelomne točke moglo bi doći u globalnoj prehrambenoj i poljoprivrednoj industriji ako naglo rastuća potražnja premaši sposobnost poljoprivrednog sustava da proizvede hranu. To znači da ponuda više ne može pratiti potražnju unatoč sve većim cijenama, osim ako se ne posvetimo nekakvoj strukturnoj promjeni. Ovoga puta neće se raditi o burzama i novcu, već o ljudima. Ljudi bi mogli umirati od gladi, a vlade bi se mogle rušiti. Pitanje do kada će ponuda uspijevati zadovoljavati rastuću potražnju zainteresiralo me dok sam se bavila trgovinom i postalo je prava opsesija. Iz interesa je preraslo u opsjednutost kada sam, istraživanjem, shvatila da sustav ne funkcionira i da se jako malo podataka koristi za donošenje tako važnih odluka. Tada sam odlučila napustiti karijeru na Wall Streetu i krenuti u poduzetničke vode te pokrenuti Gro Intelligence.
At Gro, we focus on bringing this data and doing the work to make it actionable, to empower decision-makers at every level. But doing this work, we also realized that the world, not just world leaders, but businesses and citizens like every single person in this room, lacked an actionable guide on how we can avoid a coming global food security crisis. And so we built a model, leveraging the petabytes of data we sit on, and we solved for the tipping point.
Tu smo usredotočeni na prikupljanje podataka i rad koji omogućuje osnažiti one koji donose odluke na svim razinama. No, pritom smo također shvatili da svijetu, i to ne samo svjetskim čelnicima, već i poduzetnicima te građanima poput svih nas ovdje prisutnih, nedostaju izvedive smjernice o tome kako izbjeći nadolazeću globalnu krizu sigurnosti opskrbe hranom. I tako smo izgradili model koji se oslanja na petabajtove podataka kojima raspolažemo i riješili smo sve do prijelomne točke.
Now, no one knows we've been working on this problem and this is the first time that I'm sharing what we discovered. We discovered that the tipping point is actually a decade from now. We discovered that the world will be short 214 trillion calories by 2027. The world is not in a position to fill this gap.
Nitko ne zna da smo radili na rješavanju ovog problema i prvi put otkrivam naša saznanja. Otkrili smo da će do prijelomne točke doći za deset godina. Otkrili smo da će svijetu nedostajati 214 bilijuna kalorija do 2027. Svijet nije u mogućnosti popuniti tu prazninu.
Now, you'll notice that the way I'm framing this is different from how I started, and that's intentional, because until now this problem has been quantified using mass: think kilograms, tons, hectograms, whatever your unit of choice is in mass. Why do we talk about food in terms of weight? Because it's easy. We can look at a photograph and determine tonnage on a ship by using a simple pocket calculator. We can weigh trucks, airplanes and oxcarts. But what we care about in food is nutritional value. Not all foods are created equal, even if they weigh the same. This I learned firsthand when I moved from Ethiopia to the US for university. Upon my return back home, my father, who was so excited to see me, greeted me by asking why I was fat. Now, turns out that eating approximately the same amount of food as I did in Ethiopia, but in America, had actually lent a certain fullness to my figure. This is why we should care about calories, not about mass. It is calories which sustain us.
Uviđate da sad stvari postavljam na drugi način, i to činim namjerno, jer dosad se ovaj problem kvantificirao koristeći se masom: razmišljate u kilogramima, tonama, hektogramima, ovisno o vašoj mjernoj jedinici mase. Zašto hranu izražavamo u jedinicama mase? Jer je jednostavno. Gledajući fotografiju, možemo odrediti tonažu broda uz pomoć malog džepnog kalkulatora. U stanju smo izvagati kamione, zrakoplove i zaprežna kola. Ali, u hrani nam je važna nutritivna vrijednost. Nije sva hrana jednaka, čak i ako ima istu masu. To sam naučila iz prve ruke kada sam iz Etiopije otišla studirati u SAD. Po povratku kući, moj me otac, sav uzbuđen što me vidi, dočekao pitanjem zašto sam debela. Izgleda da sam se, jedući otprilike istu količinu hrane u Americi kao i u Etiopiji, malo zaokružila. Zato se trebamo oslanjati na kalorije, a ne na masu. Kalorije su te koje nas održavaju.
So 214 trillion calories is a very large number, and not even the most dedicated of us think in the hundreds of trillions of calories. So let me break this down differently. An alternative way to think about this is to think about it in Big Macs. 214 trillion calories. A single Big Mac has 563 calories. That means the world will be short 379 billion Big Macs in 2027. That is more Big Macs than McDonald's has ever produced.
Dakle, 214 bilijuna kalorija ogromna je brojka, a ni oni najpredaniji među nama ne razmišljaju u stotinama bilijuna kalorija. Stoga ću podatke predstaviti drukčije. O tome možemo razmišljati i na drugi način, odnosno u Big Mac-ovima. 214 bilijuna kalorija. Jedan Big Mac ima 563 kalorije. To znači da će svijetu nedostajati 379 milijardi Big Mac-ova 2027.g. To je više Big Mac-ova no što ih je McDonald's ikad proizveo.
So how did we get to these numbers in the first place? They're not made up. This map shows you where the world was 40 years ago. It shows you net calorie gaps in every country in the world. Now, simply put, this is just calories consumed in that country minus calories produced in that same country. This is not a statement on malnutrition or anything else. It's simply saying how many calories are consumed in a single year minus how many are produced. Blue countries are net calorie exporters, or self-sufficient. They have some in storage for a rainy day. Red countries are net calorie importers. The deeper, the brighter the red, the more you're importing. 40 years ago, such few countries were net exporters of calories, I could count them with one hand. Most of the African continent, Europe, most of Asia, South America excluding Argentina, were all net importers of calories. And what's surprising is that China used to actually be food self-sufficient. India was a big net importer of calories.
Kako smo uopće došli do tih brojki? Nismo ih izmislili. Ova karta prikazuje svijet prije 40 godina. Pokazuje neto manjak kalorija svake države u svijetu. Jednostavno rečeno, to su samo utrošene kalorije minus proizvedene kalorije u toj zemlji. Ovo nije prikaz neishranjenosti ili bilo čega drugog. Samo ukazuje na to koliko se kalorija troši u jednoj godini umanjeno za količinu koja se proizvede. Plave zemlje su izvoznici neto kalorija, ili oni samodostatni. Imaju zalihe hrane. Crvene zemlje su uvoznici neto kalorija. Što je crvena bolja tamnija, više se uvozi. Prije 40 godina samo neke zemlje bile su neto izvoznici kalorija, mogla sam ih nabrojati na prste jedne ruke. Većina afričkog kontinenta, Europa, veći dio Azije, Južna Amerika osim Argentine, bile su neto uvoznici kalorija. A iznenađujuće je da je Kina nekad imala dovoljno hrane za svoje potrebe. Indija je bila veliki neto uvoznik kalorija.
40 years later, this is today. You can see the drastic transformation that's occurred in the world. Brazil has emerged as an agricultural powerhouse. Europe is dominant in global agriculture. India has actually flipped from red to blue. It's become food self-sufficient. And China went from that light blue to the brightest red that you see on this map.
40 godina kasnije, ovo je stanje danas. Vidite drastičnu promjenu u svijetu. Brazil je postao nova poljoprivredna sila. Europa dominira u svjetskoj poljoprivredi. Indija je iz crvenog prešla u plavo. Postala je samodostatna u pogledu hrane. A Kina je iz svjetlo plave prešla na najjaču crvenu na cijeloj karti.
How did we get here? What happened? So this chart shows you India and Africa. Blue line is India, red line is Africa. How is it that two regions that started off so similarly in such similar trajectories take such different paths? India had a green revolution. Not a single African country had a green revolution. The net outcome? India is food self-sufficient and in the past decade has actually been exporting calories. The African continent now imports over 300 trillion calories a year. Then we add China, the green line. Remember the switch from the blue to the bright red? What happened and when did it happen? China seemed to be on a very similar path to India until the start of the 21st century, where it suddenly flipped. A young and growing population combined with significant economic growth made its mark with a big bang and no one in the markets saw it coming. This flip was everything to global agricultural markets. Luckily now, South America was starting to boom at the same time as China's rise, and so therefore, supply and demand were still somewhat balanced.
Kako smo do toga došli? Što se dogodilo? Ovaj grafikon prikazuje Indiju i Afriku. Plava linija je Indija, crvena Afrika. Kako je moguće da dvije regije koje su toliko slično započele, sličnim putanjama, krenu toliko različitim putevima? Indija je doživjela zelenu revoluciju. Nijedna afrička zemlja nije ju doživjela. Rezultat? Indija je samodostatna u pogledu hrane te je u posljednjem desetljeću čak i izvozila kalorije. Afrički kontinent sada uvozi više od 300 bilijuna kalorija godišnje. Zatim dodamo Kinu, zelena linija. Sjećate se prijelaza iz plave u žarku crvenu? Što se dogodilo i kada? Čini se da je Kina bila na sličnoj putanji kao i Indija sve do početka 21. stoljeća, kada se odjednom promijenila. Mlado i rastuće stanovništvo te značajan gospodarski rast doveli su do prekretnice, koju nitko na tržištima nije naslutio. Taj je pomak sve promijenio na svjetskim poljoprivrednim tržištima. Srećom, Južna Amerika počela je cvasti istovremeno s porastom u Kini pa su ponuda i potražnja još uvijek bile uglavnom uravnotežene.
So the question becomes, where do we go from here? Oddly enough, it's not a new story, except this time it's not just a story of China. It's a continuation of China, an amplification of Africa and a paradigm shift in India. By 2023, Africa's population is forecasted to overtake that of India's and China's. By 2023, these three regions combined will make up over half the world's population. This crossover point starts to present really interesting challenges for global food security. And a few years later, we're hit hard with that reality.
I sad se postavlja pitanje, kamo dalje? Neobično, ali to nije ništa novo, osim što se ovoga puta ne radi samo o Kini. U Kini se priča nastavlja, u Africi proširuje, dok u Indiji dolazi do promjene obrasca. Do 2023., predviđa se da će stanovništvo Afrike premašiti ono Indije i Kine. Do 2023., ove tri regije zajedno činit će više od polovine svjetskog stanovništva. Ta prijelazna točka donosi zaista zanimljive izazove za svjetsku sigurnost opskrbe hranom. I nekoliko godina kasnije, ta nas stvarnost sustiže.
What does the world look like in 10 years? So far, as I mentioned, India has been food self-sufficient. Most forecasters predict that this will continue. We disagree. India will soon become a net importer of calories. This will be driven both by the fact that demand is growing from a population growth standpoint plus economic growth. It will be driven by both. And even if you have optimistic assumptions around production growth, it will make that slight flip. That slight flip can have huge implications.
Kako će svijet izgledati za 10 godina? Dosad je Indija bila samodostatna u pogledu hrane. Većina predviđa da će tako biti i dalje. Mi se ne slažemo. Indija će uskoro postati neto uvoznik kalorija. I to stoga što raste potražnja, zbog porasta stanovništva te gospodarskog rasta. Oba su faktora uzrok tome. Čak i ako ste optimistični oko rasta proizvodnje, doći će do laganog pomaka. A taj lagani pomak može imati ogromne posljedice.
Next, Africa will continue to be a net importer of calories, again driven by population growth and economic growth. This is again assuming optimistic production growth assumptions. Then China, where population is flattening out, calorie consumption will explode because the types of calories consumed are also starting to be higher-calorie-content foods. And so therefore, these three regions combined start to present a really interesting challenge for the world.
Zatim, Afrika će i dalje uvoziti kalorije, opet zbog rasta stanovništva i gospodarskog rasta. I opet uzimajući u obzir optimistične pretpostavke rasta proizvodnje. Zatim Kina, u kojoj broj stanovništva stagnira, potrošnja kalorija će drastično porasti, jer će se sve više trošiti hrana bogata kalorijama. Stoga, ove tri regije zajedno postaju zanimljiv izazov svijetu.
Until now, countries with calorie deficits have been able to meet these deficits by importing from surplus regions. By surplus regions, I'm talking about North America, South America and Europe. This line chart over here shows you the growth and the projected growth over the next decade of production from North America, South America and Europe. What it doesn't show you is that most of this growth is actually going to come from South America. And most of this growth is going to come at the huge cost of deforestation. And so when you look at the combined demand increase coming from India, China and the African continent, and look at it versus the combined increase in production coming from India, China, the African continent, North America, South America and Europe, you are left with a 214-trillion-calorie deficit, one we can't produce. And this, by the way, is actually assuming we take all the extra calories produced in North America, South America and Europe and export them solely to India, China and Africa.
Dosad su zemlje s manjkom kalorija taj manjak mogle nadoknaditi uvozom iz regija s viškom. Pod regijama s viškom mislim na Sjevernu i Južnu Ameriku te Europu. Ovaj grafikon prikazuje rast i predviđeni rast za naredno desetljeće u proizvodnji u Sjevernoj i Južnoj Americi te Europi. No, ne pokazuje da će najveći dio tog rasta, zapravo, doći iz Južne Amerike. I većina tog rasta ostvarit će se nauštrb krčenja šuma. Kad gledamo svu veću potražnju iz Indije, Kine i Afrike i usporedimo je sa sve većom proizvodnjom u Indiji, Kini i Africi, Sjevernoj i Južnoj Americi te Europi, ostaje nam manjak od 214 bilijuna kalorija koje ne možemo proizvesti. I to ako pretpostavimo da sav višak kalorija, proizveden u Sjevernoj i Južnoj Americi te Europi izvezemo samo u Indiju, Kinu i Afriku.
What I just presented to you is a vision of an impossible world. We can do something to change that. We can change consumption patterns, we can reduce food waste, or we can make a bold commitment to increasing yields exponentially.
Upravo sam vam iznijela viziju nemogućeg svijeta. Možemo nešto učiniti da to promijenimo. Možemo promijeniti obrasce potrošnje, smanjiti rasipanje hrane, ili se hrabro obvezati da ćemo znatno povećati prinose.
Now, I'm not going to go into discussing changing consumption patterns or reducing food waste, because those conversations have been going on for some time now. Nothing has happened. Nothing has happened because those arguments ask the surplus regions to change their behavior on behalf of deficit regions. Waiting for others to change their behavior on your behalf, for your survival, is a terrible idea. It's unproductive.
Neću sada govoriti o promjeni obrazaca potrošnje, smanjenju bacanja hrane, jer se o tome raspravlja već neko vrijeme. Ništa se nije dogodilo. Ništa se nije dogodilo zato što se u tim raspravama od regija s viškom traži da promijene ponašanje u ime deficitarnih regija. Čekati da drugi promjene ponašanje, zbog vas i radi vašeg opstanka, grozna je ideja. To nije produktivno.
So I'd like to suggest an alternative that comes from the red regions. China, India, Africa. China is constrained in terms of how much more land it actually has available for agriculture, and it has massive water resource availability issues. So the answer really lies in India and in Africa. India has some upside in terms of potential yield increases. Now this is the gap between its current yield and the theoretical maximum yield it can achieve. It has some unfarmed arable land remaining, but not much, India is quite land-constrained. Now, the African continent, on the other hand, has vast amounts of arable land remaining and significant upside potential in yields. Somewhat simplified picture here, but if you look at sub-Saharan African yields in corn today, they are where North American yields were in 1940. We don't have 70-plus years to figure this out, so it means we need to try something new and we need to try something different. The solution starts with reforms. We need to reform and commercialize the agricultural industries in Africa and in India.
Stoga bih predložila drugo rješenje koje dolazi iz crvenih regija. Iz Kine, Indije i Afrike. Kina je ograničena u pogledu površina raspoloživih za obradu zemlje, a ima i ogromne probleme s dostupnošću vodenih resursa. Stoga odgovor leži u Indiji i Africi. Indija ima potencijal za porast prinosa. To je jaz između trenutačnog prinosa i teoretskog najvećeg prinosa koji može postići. Preostalo je još nešto malo neobrađenih oranica, ali Indija je tu prilično ograničena. Afrički kontinent, s druge strane, raspolaže ogromnim obradivim površinama i ima znatni potencijal rasta prinosa. Nešto pojednostavljena slika, no, ako pogledate kakav je danas prinos kukuruza u supsaharskoj Africi, vidjet ćete da je isti onome u Sjevernoj Americi 1940. Nemamo 70 i više godina da to riješimo, znači moramo pokušati nešto novo i nešto drugačije. Rješenje kreće s reformama. Moramo uvesti reforme i komercijalizirati poljoprivredne industrije u Africi i Indiji.
Now, by commercialization -- commercialization is not about commercial farming alone. Commercialization is about leveraging data to craft better policies, to improve infrastructure, to lower the transportation costs and to completely reform banking and insurance industries. Commercialization is about taking agriculture from too risky an endeavor to one where fortunes can be made. Commercialization is not about just farmers. Commercialization is about the entire agricultural system. But commercialization also means confronting the fact that we can no longer place the burden of growth on small-scale farmers alone, and accepting that commercial farms and the introduction of commercial farms could provide certain economies of scale that even small-scale farmers can leverage. It is not about small-scale farming or commercial agriculture, or big agriculture. We can create the first successful models of the coexistence and success of small-scale farming alongside commercial agriculture. This is because, for the first time ever, the most critical tool for success in the industry -- data and knowledge -- is becoming cheaper by the day. And very soon, it won't matter how much money you have or how big you are to make optimal decisions and maximize probability of success in reaching your intended goal. Companies like Gro are working really hard to make this a reality.
Pod komercijalizacijom ne mislim samo na komercijalne poljoprivredne djelatnosti, već i na upotrebu podataka u cilju izrade boljih politika, poboljšanja infrastrukture, smanjenja troškova prijevoza i provođenja potpune reforme industrija bankarstva i osiguranja. Komercijalizacija znači i usmjeravanje poljoprivrede s prerizičnih pothvata na one koji donose ogromnu dobit. Komercijalizacija se ne odnosi samo na poljoprivrednike. Odnosi se na cijeli poljoprivredni sustav. Ali ona znači i da se moramo suočiti s činjenicom da više ne možemo teret rasta prepustiti samo malim poljoprivrednicima te prihvatiti da komercijalne farme i njihovo uvođenje mogu dovesti do određenih ekonomskih razmjera, čime mogu profitirati čak i mali poljoprivrednici. Ne radi se o malim poljoprivrednicima, ni o komercijalnoj poljoprivredi, ili o velikim poljoprivrednicima. Možemo stvoriti prve uspješne modele suživota i uspjeha između malih poljoprivrednika i komercijalne poljoprivrede. I to stoga što, po prvi puta u povijesti, najvažnije sredstvo za uspjeh u industriji, podaci i znanje, postaju svakim danom sve jeftiniji. I uskoro pitanje koliko novca imate ili koliko ste veliki neće biti presudno za donošenje optimalnih odluka i poboljšanje izgleda za uspješno ostvarivanje cilja. Društva poput Gro-a naporno rade na ostvarenju toga.
So if we can commit to this new, bold initiative, to this new, bold change, not only can we solve the 214-trillion gap that I talked about, but we can actually set the world on a whole new path. India can remain food self-sufficient and Africa can emerge as the world's next dark blue region.
Ako se možemo posvetiti toj novoj, smjeloj inicijativi, toj novoj i smjeloj promjeni, ne samo da možemo riješiti manjak od 214 bilijuna kalorija, već možemo svijet usmjeriti u potpuno novom pravcu. Indija može i dalje zadovoljavati svoje potrebe za hranom, a Afrika može postati sljedeća tamno plava regija.
The new question is, how do we produce 214 trillion calories to feed 8.3 billion people by 2027? We have the solution. We just need to act on it.
Novo je pitanje, kako proizvesti 214 bilijuna kalorija da nahranimo 8,3 milijardi ljudi do 2027.? Imamo rješenje. Samo moramo djelovati.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Pljesak)