insights - October 2018 - 1

insights
Sponsored by INTL FCStone Inc.

Publication of Sosland Publishing Company

Innovation in Agriculture and Food Manufacturing
Consumers play an increasingly pivotal role
What's happening now to advance food production and
processing, and what needs to happen for farmers and
food manufacturers to keep up?
Agriculture and food production are both basic and
progressive, and the need for innovation is accelerating
as the world's population grows, the climate changes
and consumer expectations increase. Drones and global
positioning satellites (G.P.S.) already have found their
way into production agriculture, as have the concepts of

sustainability, big data, precision agriculture, blockchain
and more.
The scope of innovation in agriculture is far too broad
to address in a single paper, so just four key areas will be
highlighted.
* Consumers
* Farming
* Ingredients/Procurement
* Processing/Distribution
burgeoning, the demand for protein is skyrocketing. In
developed nations such as the United States, the large
baby boomer population is "aging out" and millennials
and generations X, Y and Z are becoming the dominant
buying and consuming population groups.
Much of what is happening across the food chain is
increasingly driven by consumers, whether it be simple
demographics or complicated trends. Some of those
changes include:

1

Consumers

There has been considerable discussion about feeding
a global population forecast at about 9.8 billion by 2050
(population numbers forecast by the United Nations'
Department of Economic and Social Affairs). That's 25%
more people to feed in 22 years. Consumers in many
countries are just seeking enough calories to survive. In
other countries such as China where the middle class is

*
*
*
*
*
*
*

Wellness and healthy living
Clean labels (minimally processed)
Farm-to-table (fresh)
Concerns about G.M.O.s
Transparency
Sustainability
Convenience

Millennials' and younger generations' preoccupation
with technology has affected shopping as well as food
production and processing. As younger generations
and technology are defining consumers, so too is
technology playing a key role in food production,
processing and distribution. The question is, how will
the world produce, process and distribute food to a
growing, shifting, aging, more urbanized but widely
diverse population?



Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of insights - October 2018

https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/insights-sponsored-by-stonex-august-2021
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/insights-sponsored-by-stonex
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2020_05_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2019_12_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2018_11_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2018_10_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2018_02_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2016_08_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2015_11_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2015_06_01
https://www.nxtbook.com/sosland/fcs/2014_11_01
https://www.nxtbookmedia.com