The Coming Food Crisis
Global food security is stretched to the breaking point, and
Russia's fires and Pakistan's floods are only making a bad situation
worse.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/08/26/the_coming_food_crisis?page=0,1
Terrascope – Guiding Principles
•
The Earth system provides a context for learning
basic science and engineering concepts
•
Students put those concepts to use in creative ways
to understand the interdependency of physical,
chemical, and biological processes that shape our
planet
•
Students explore how these concepts may be used
to design protocols to ensure a sustainable
environment
•
Program emphasizes both theory and practice, and
puts a premium on active learning
Terrascope – Structure
First Semester
•
Solving Complex Problems--Mission 2xxx
Second Semester
•
1.016
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Terrascope Field Experience (Spring Break)
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Terrascope Radio
Solving Complex Problems
•
Multidisciplinary, project-based learning
experience
•
Students work toward a solution to a
deceptively simple problem related to Earth’s
environment
•
Each year’s theme is different and referred to as
“Mission XXXX”, where XXXX refers to the
graduation year of the class involved
Solving Complex Problems--Motivation
• To build in you the capacity to tackle the “big”
problems that confront society
• To encourage you to take charge of the learning
process
• To show you how to do independent
research, to evaluate the quality of information
sources, and to synthesize different information
streams
Solving Complex Problems--Motivation
• To encourage you to think about optimal
solutions rather than correct solutions
• To help you learn how to work effectively as
part of a team
• To improve your communication skills using two
media: the web site and the formal oral
presentation
• To convince you of your potential!!
Past Missions
•
Develop a viable plan for the exploration of Mars
with the aim of finding evidence for life
•
Design permanent, manned, underwater
research laboratories and develop detailed
research plans for the first six months of their
operation
•
Design the most environmentally sensitive
strategy for hydrocarbon resource extraction
from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and
determine whether or not the value of the
resource exceeds its financial and
environmental cost
Past Missions
•
To develop strategies for developing countries in
the Pacific basin to cope with tsunami hazards
and disasters. Due to the unique needs of each
country, we specifically focused on developing
plans for Peru and Micronesia.
•
To develop a plan for the reconstruction of New
Orleans and the management of the Mississippi
River and the Gulf coast. The reconstruction of
New Orleans and the management of the
Mississippi River and the Gulf coast.
Past Missions
•
To develop strategies to deal with the collapse of
the global fisheries and the general health of the
oceans
•
To develop a plan to ensure the availability of
fresh clean water for western North America for
the next 100 years.
•
Propose an integrated global solution to the
rapid rise in atmospheric CO2 that will stabilize
concentrations at an economically viable and
internationally acceptable level.
Subject Structure
Problem divided into approximately ten tasks;
students divided into teams
Each team assigned a Teaching Fellow, Alumni
Mentors, and Disciplinary Mentors
Four meeting styles:
•
Presentations on methodology
•
Case-study discussions
•
Team workshops
•
Coordination meetings
Subject Deliverables
•
Each student develops a personal wiki
•
Each team will communicate through wiki-based
structure
 Each class describes and justifies its overall
plan in a web site
 Each class explains the design in a two-hour
presentation before a panel of experts and a
general audience
Mission 2011
Mission 2012
“What I have learned is that passion, along with curiosity, drives science.
Passion is the mysterious force behind nearly every scientific
breakthrough. Perhaps it’s because without it you might never be able to
tolerate the huge amount of hard work and frustration that scientific
discovery
entails….”
“For the next four years you will get to poke around the corridors of your
college, listen to any lecture you choose, work in a lab. The field of science
you fall in love with may be so new it doesn’t even have a name yet. You
may be the person who constructs a new biological species, or figures out
how to stop global warming, or aging. Maybe you’ll discover life on another
planet. My advice to you is this: Don’t settle for anything less.”
Nancy Hopkins, a professor of biology at M.I.T., has been teaching since
1973.
Extracted from OP-ED contribution in New York Times, September 5 2009
Subject Grading
Individual performance (30%)
Team performance (30%)
Class accomplishment (40%)
Wikis
Share files in teams, class
–
–
–
–
Avoid large attachments (please!)
All files online
Set permissions - who can read, edit
Know about others’ work
• Avoid doubling up, missing topics
– Get good quality writing early
• You’ll be happy later, we promise
Wikis - structure
• One wiki
• One section per team
– All read, team read/write
• One section per student inside team
– All read, student read/write
Wiki - requirements
• Each student:
– Keep ongoing journal as a wiki page
• Ideas, progress, problems
• One or two paragraphs
– UPDATE EVERY WEEK!!!!
• Each team:
– Write research online, different pages
per topics
– Show progress every week
Mission 2014
Your mission is to design a plan that will
produce and distribute enough food to feed
the planet over the next century, while
ensuring that efficiency and equity are
maximized with minimal disruption to the
environment.
In 2009, > 1 billion people went undernourished.
Undernourishment tracks with poverty--not necessarily with lack
of food.
Nature v. 466, p. 546-547
The number of hungry people had been dropping steadily for
decades until the food price crisis in 2008 reversed the trend.
Population growth is slowing and
overall availability of calories per
person is rising. Producing
enough food is possible, but not
without sapping other resources,
like water.
It is possible, but likely not advisable to nearly double the amount of arable
land--Most of it in Latin America and Africa.
Need to do more and
use less.
Increased public
investment in
agricultural research is
crucial
Phosphate-based fertilizers have
helped grow Ag in the past
century, but supplies are limited.
Phosphate mining generates 10’s
of billions of dollars annually
Phosphate is often THE limiting
nutrient to plant growth
Possible that reserves will vanish
within the century if growth
continues at 3% per year
Phosphate shortage MORE
important than oil shortage?
“In the case of some finite resources, such as
oil, alternatives can be found. But there are currently
no substitutes for phosphates.”
Nature v. 461, p. 716-718
Global food production is
increasing but farming systems
remain unchanged, undermining
long-term productivity.
Immediate need to evaluate the
impact of different farming
systems--on more than just yield
and productivity-based grounds.
Current monitoring focuses on
narrow criteria that are regionspecific, not global.
Does the practice:
•Produce greenhouse gasses
•use space efficiently
•limit pesticides
•limit runoff
•maximize yield
We need a global system to
assess and compare farming
practices.
“The structure
would be similar to that of the Human Genome
Project — in which hundreds of scientists at
dozens of sequencing centres worldwide
harmonized
their work while maintaining their
independence and specialized focus.”
In Mozambique, 13 people were killed and 150 arrested in riots resulting from a
30% hike bread prices.
Overall food prices on
the global market have
What alters bread prices?
increased 5% since
drought
July.
flooding
“Their food security is excessively dependent on food imports whose prices are increasingly high and volatile.”
fires
commodity traders
driving up prices
Climate change could change
the way plants are pollinated
and how crops are irrigated,
which will affect food security
•plants flowering before bees
are awake for the season
•erratic rainfall leads to
drought, flood, and fire
"We are getting to a point where we are getting more water,
more rainy days, but it's more variable, so it leads to droughts
and it leads to floods,"
Non-irrigated crops are most
severely hit
66% in Asia
94% in Africa
http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Flooded-farm-land-southern-Punjab-Pakistan-Eight-million-people-Pakistan
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/greenhouse/post/2010/09/climate-change-threatens-bees-flowers-food/1
Mission 2014
Recent studies by the the UN Food and Agriculture
Organization suggest that the world will need at least
70% more food by 2050 and will have to produce it on
less land.
Fertilizer and pesticide use is rapidly increasing
Climate change and patterns of precipitation are
changing our ability to grow crops
Mission 2014
Enhanced agriculture means greater
environmental impact including increased
energy use, greenhouse gas production,
reliance on pest management, nutrient run-off,
biodiversity loss from land conversion and
monocultures, soil loss, and overall water
usage. We must utilize advanced cropping
techniques, and possibly even an entirely new
approach to agriculture, in order to mitigate
those impacts.
Mission 2014
Recently, fisheries' experts have warned that three
quarters of the world’s fish stocks are in distress and
nearing collapse, all the while overall marine
ecosystems are rapidly deteriorating, making it more
difficult for them to bounce back even if fishing were
stopped. Given that fish provide more than 2.9 billion
people with at least 15 per cent of their average
animal protein intake, an contribute more than 50 per
cent of total animal protein in many small island
countries, the collapse of the fisheries will have a
huge impact.
Important Questions to Address
• What are the consequences of
doing nothing?
• Is access to food and clean water a
basic human right?
Class Structure
We will present possible team topics and allow you to “selforganize”
• Each of you will be assigned to a team, and each team will
be assigned at least one upperclass teaching fellow (UTF),
a library liaison, and multiple alumni mentors
• Each team will be responsible for proposing to the class
one or more options for its assigned part of the solution
• Teams will work independently and will be responsible for
their own solutions, although mentors and volunteer
faculty resources may be called upon as “sounding
boards”.
Important Contacts
Sam Bowring
sbowring@mit.edu
Seth Burgess
sburgess@mit.edu
First Assignment (Due this Friday by 2 PM)
• Do wealthy countries buy farmland in poor
countries? Should this be allowed under
international law?
• What country has the most number of people
threatened by chronic hunger?
• Is there a conflict between growing biofuels and
feeding the world?
• Do you think we should do more as a species to
limit population growth?
• Why are crop subsidies an issue for food security?
• Send me a brief email (sbowring@mit.edu) with
your answers
Meeting Places
• Class will meet in three different places, so
consult the “Syllabus” page before each class
meeting to see where you will go
• THIS FRIDAY WE MEET in 3-270
• http://web.mit.edu/12.000/www/m2014/