AUTHOR=Davies Fred T. , Garrett Banning TITLE=Technology for Sustainable Urban Food Ecosystems in the Developing World: Strengthening the Nexus of Food–Water–Energy–Nutrition JOURNAL=Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems VOLUME=2 YEAR=2018 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-food-systems/articles/10.3389/fsufs.2018.00084 DOI=10.3389/fsufs.2018.00084 ISSN=2571-581X ABSTRACT=

Smart integration of technology can help create sustainable urban food ecosystems (UFEs) for the rapidly expanding urban population in the developing world. Technology, especially recent advances in digital-enabled devices based on internet connectivity, are essential for building UFEs at a time when food production is increasingly limited on a global scale by the availability of land, water, and energy. By 2050, two-thirds of the world will be urban—and most of the net world population growth will occur in urban regions in the developing world. A food crisis is looming, with the developing world ill-prepared to sustainably feed itself. We identify 12 innovative technology platforms to advance the UFEs of the developing world: (1) connectivity—information delivery and digital technology platforms; (2) uberized services; (3) precision agriculture (GPS, IoT—Internet of things, AI—artificial intelligence, sensing technology); (4) CEA—controlled environment agriculture, including vertical farms; (5) blockchain for greater transparency, food safety, and identification; (6) solar and wind power connected to microgrids; (7) high-quality, enhanced seeds for greater yield, nutrition, climate, and pest resistance; (8) advanced genetics, including gene editing, synthetic biology, and cloud biology; (9) biotechnology, including microbiome editing, soil biologicals, cultured meat, alternative proteins to meat and dairy; (10) nanotechnology and advanced materials; (11) 3-D printing/additive manufacturing; and (12) integration of new tech to scale-up underutilized, existing technologies. The new tech-enabled UFEs, linked to value-chains, will create entrepreneurial opportunities—and more efficiently use resources and people to connect the nexus of food, water, energy, and nutrition.