title: Food security in a perfect storm: using the ecosystem services framework to increase understanding.
abstract: Achieving food security in a 'perfect storm' scenario is a grand challenge for society. Climate change and an expanding global population act in concert to make global food security even more complex and demanding. As achieving food security and the millennium development goal (MDG) to eradicate hunger influences the attainment of other MDGs, it is imperative that we offer solutions which are complementary and do not oppose one another. Sustainable intensification of agriculture has been proposed as a way to address hunger while also minimizing further environmental impact. However, the desire to raise productivity and yields has historically led to a degraded environment, reduced biodiversity and a reduction in ecosystem services (ES), with the greatest impacts affecting the poor. This paper proposes that the ES framework coupled with a policy response framework, for example Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR), can allow food security to be delivered alongside healthy ecosystems, which provide many other valuable services to humankind. Too often, agro-ecosystems have been considered as separate from other natural ecosystems and insufficient attention has been paid to the way in which services can flow to and from the agro-ecosystem to surrounding ecosystems. Highlighting recent research in a large multi-disciplinary project (ASSETS), we illustrate the ES approach to food security using a case study from the Zomba district of Malawi.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Biological Sciences, University of Southampton, , Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK.
authors.forename: G M
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Poppy
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Chiotha
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Eigenbrod
authors.forename: C A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Harvey
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Honzák
authors.forename: M D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Hudson
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Jarvis
authors.forename: N J
authors.initials: NJ
authors.lastname: Madise
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Schreckenberg
authors.forename: C M
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Shackleton
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Villa
authors.forename: T P
authors.initials: TP
authors.lastname: Dawson
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D057231:Climate Change; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D017753:Ecosystem; D005523:Food Supply / Q000379:methods*; D008295:Malawi; D011158:Population Growth
keywords: Malawi; agriculture–forest interface; ecosystem services; food security; models