Contemporary Issues, 2nd prize
Feeding China
George Steinmetz
16 June, 2016
Workers process chickens at a facility belonging to the large state-owned food-processing conglomerate, COFCO, in Suqian, near Shanghai.
Rapidly rising incomes in China have led to a changing diet and increasing demand for meat, dairy and processed foods. China needs to make use of some 12 percent of the world’s arable land to feed nearly 19% of the global population.
New technologies and agricultural reform offer a partial solution, but problems remain as farmers and the young flock to work in cities, leaving an aging rural population, and as land becomes contaminated by industry.
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