The Global Food System

Catalog description

This interdisciplinary course provides students with an overview of food systems characteristics, exploring how local and regional influences compare with those occurring at the global level. Exploration of major historical developments in the food systems of the past 500 years occurs in order to comprehend how they are influenced by social, political, economic and ecological environments. Students explore the complexities and diversity of the global food system identifying potential challenges facing producers, consumers and policy makers. Aspects of the global food system are examined in the context of a variety of environmental and social challenges ranging from sustainability, climate change and ecosystem degradation to rising rates of obesity and malnutrition. Students debate the challenges of providing a modern food system that can sustain a growing global population living in the midst of increasingly post-industrial societies.