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Building a sustainable food source Complete the following text on the question how we will feed the planet in 2050 with the correct forms of the verbs given. If you have any lingering illusions that your weekly grocery shop is going to decrease (1 decrease ) in cost miraculously, forget about them. Rising food prices are a reality we (2 have to ) deal with in future. “The era of cheap food is over,” says sustainable food expert Paul McMahon. He explains, “There are solid reasons to believe food (3 stay ) more expensive in the next decades because of severe weather conditions around the globe and the production of biofuels. We (4 see ) higher food prices than before.” McMahon is adamant that the planet (5 not run out ) of food, but that issues with overproduction and distribution are preventing it from getting to everyone. “Fundamentally, people go hungry not because there isn’t enough food but because they can’t afford to buy food,” he says. “To address that problem, we (6 need ) to help poorer communities earn higher incomes and go through a process of economic development.” Times had changed from the 1980s, when there were regular media reports about “butter mountains” and “wine lakes” across Europe. “Because food has been too cheap, we have taken it for granted,” McMahon explains. “As food (7 get ) more expensive, one of the positive benefits of that probably (8 be ) that we waste less because we (9 think ) more carefully about what we buy and make sure that less ends up in the bin.” “The real problem is underproduction in poor countries,” McMahon analyses. “The advice which a lot of those countries were given for many years was: Don’t worry about growing your own food because you can always rely on cheap American or European exports. That turned out not to be a good strategy for food security or economic development.” According to the expert, it’s necessary that in the future small farmers in Africa in particular (10 empower ) to grow more for their domestic markets so that eventually these regions (11 become ) a bread basket for the rest of the world too because of the big reserves of land and water. For now, it looks as if the increase in food prices (12 continue ) . “There are some fundamental supply-and-demand reasons why prices are high,” says McMahon. “Total world production of the basic grains wheat, rice and maize was lower than world consumption for seven out of eight years. We are, in effect, living off our reserves. It’s inevitable you (13 have ) high prices in that situation when you have tight supplies. The high price is not the problem in itself – it’s a symptom of those underlying problems.” (Ross McGuiness, Metro .co.uk , 3 April 2013; adapted and abridged) 3 62 Saving the planet 12 Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv