Food production shocks across land and sea

Abstract

Sudden losses to food production-shocks-and their consequences across land and sea pose cumulative threats to global sustainability. We conduct an integrated assessment of global production data from crop, livestock, aquaculture, and fisheries sectors over 53 years to understand how shocks occurring in one food sector can create diverse and linked challenges among others. We show that some regions are shock hotspots, exposed frequently to shocks across multiple sectors. Critically, shock frequency has increased through time on land and sea at a global scale. Geopolitical and extreme-weather events were the main shock drivers identified, although with considerable differences across sectors. We illustrate how socialecological drivers, influenced by dynamics of the food system, can spillover multiple food sectors and create synchronous challenges or trade-offs among terrestrial and aquatic systems. In a more shock-prone and interconnected world, bold food policy and social protection mechanisms that help people anticipate, cope and recover from losses will be central to sustainability. Main Food production shocks pose significant challenges for the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 1 because of their potential to disrupt food supply and security, livelihoods, and human well-being 2-7. A wide range of social-ecological pressures on food systems can drive shocks through direct or indirect mechanisms. For example, droughts or floods can rapidly increase mortality of crops, livestock, or farmed fish; whereas sudden outbreaks of violent conflict may prevent farmers or fishers accessing their production systems 7,8. Prolonged overfishing can also produce unexpected, sudden losses in catch as exploited fish populations are pushed toward ecological tipping points, after which stock collapse occurs 9. People's vulnerability to shock events rests on their capacity to adapt, the scale and frequency of RSC, JLB, KLN, and BSH designed the study, and RSC conducted the analysis and wrote the paper. TAR assisted with figures and AJ assisted with qualitative analysis of shock drivers.

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