The agricultural dimension of the Green New Deal: Towards sustainable agriculture as the rule

Since the beginning of the 21st century, we have been witnessing multiple crises; economic, social, environmental and ideological. The deepening of social inequalities, the depletion of natural resources, the ongoing problems with poverty and hunger and more broadly the increasing societal unease with the fast pace of globalisation, are only a few illustrations revealing the fundamental flaws in our current societal model.

The Green New Deal (GND) is a comprehensive response to these crises.

It aims to reconcile our lifestyles - the way we live, produce and consume - with the physical limits of our planet. It is a transformational journey consisting of sweeping, interlinked reforms at all levels and all sectors. Agriculture is at the crossroads of the challenges which the GND aims to tackle and at the heart of the ecological transformation our societies need to undergo.

“Climate change, hunger and poverty, loss of biodiversity, forest destruction, water crises, food safety – what all these threats have in common is that a principal cause for each of them is the way we produce, trade, consume and discard food and other agricultural products1”. By its nature, agriculture is the activity par excellence at the service of the people and the planet, as it meets one of humankind’s most basic needs, i.e. food, and manages a significant share of our planet's natural resources. 

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