Towards Food Justice – The Global-Economic Material Balance Analysis of Hunger, Food Security and Waste

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please read my comment in a separate file

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewers,

We sincerely thank you for your thorough and excellent work. I do not say this as a matter of politeness, but you really were in harmony that we wanted too much in one article, somewhat mashing external factors (food waste, due to inefficiency + excess profit maximization) and internal factors (obesity etc.) We deleted the latter and will work it our in a separate article. This was a painful procedure, shortening the article with 30% (from 23 to 16 pages), but we thank again for helping us to make our main message more clear and acceptable!

This paper proposed an interesting idea. However, I think it needs to be rewritten and restructured. It is not easy to follow the idea as you mentioned many things in the paper and not focussed on the main topic. You need to make it more focus, concise, and presenting argument based on the results instead of only explaining the results.

Right, we made it more focused and concise.

In detail, the are some issues that I want to raise consisting of:

1. In the introduction (section 1) you explained a lot of things including poverty, hunger, obesity, unemployment, social justice, food security, health, economic development, etc. I know that all those things are related each other, but you need to focus on the background why you want to examine a question “if all produced and wasted food would be put available to feed the extreme poor hungry, can we reach zero hunger deaths?”. Why this question is so important and what is the novelty comparing to other papers that also discussed about inequality food distribution that drive global hunger such as:

• Hossain, N. (2017) 'Inequality, Hunger, and Malnutrition: Power Matters', in Global Hunger Index: The inequalities of hunger. Chapter 3 pp 24-29. Washington, D.C.; Bonn; and Dublin: International Food Policy Research Institute, Welthungerhilfe, and Concern Worldwide
• Janssens, C., Havlík, P., Krisztin, T. et al. Global hunger and climate change adaptation through international trade. Nat. Clim. Chang. 10, 829–835 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-020-0847-4

Explanation is added in lines 199-204, literature amended with the two items.

2. In the section 2, I think it becomes more focus on your proposed idea than in the background (section 1). However, I don’t understand why you put “Basic data context: The unhappy many” as the title of this section. This doesn’t represent the hypothesis that you want to propose in this section.

Yes, we agree, we changed the subtitle to the more precise and less ideological: “Hunger and Foodwaste”

3. Again, in the section 2 you rather discussed about obesity and bulimia than explaining the aim of this paper which is to evaluate the Food Problem Triangle: undernourishment-obesity-food loss (line 231-232). Furthermore, this aim looks different with the title as you mentioned hunger, obesity, food security and waste. Undernourishment should be different with hunger and discussion about food security is also missing here.

Deleted.

4. Regarding the hypothesis, why at the end you only focused on hunger issue? How about the obesity, food security and waste? Furthermore, could you explain the relationship between those three hypotheses and the aims that you want to achieve.

We explained and deleted hypothesis 2.

5. In hypothesis 1 you examined the trend of diminishing hunger until 2030, while in hypothesis 2 and 3 you want to prove that produced and surplus food as well as utilization of food waste could eliminate hunger. Actually, what do you want to explain by these hypotheses? Are you trying to explain that the main problem is food distribution?

Yes, and the market logic of the fixation on solvent demand, above humanity and the paradigm of “economism” behind. We published on this before in detail. It is now shortly explained in this paper.

6. In the method section you combine the method and results at once, thus it makes confusion. I think you need to separate methods and results section.

We agree and inserted 4. Results section to page 12.

7. In section 3.1 you calculate the diminishing trend of hunger by discussing data trend of overweight and underweight. Is it hunger is really similar to underweight? I think you need to explain this before using underweight data for representing hunger. I think the data trend of undernourished adults are more suitable to represent hunger.

We will work this out in a separate article.

8. In the section 3.2, it seems you want to show the problem of lack of food in Africa that could be supplied by food surplus in other continents, especially Europe. However, it is a bit confusing as you also show food situation in more number countries in Figure 7 and Figure 8. Looking at these figures actually the problem of food deficient was not only found in Africa but also in other countries in other continents. I think you need to focusing your data and analysis at the continent level.

Sorry, no. We see clearly, that supply food to Africa from surplus of other continents, is very difficult question. We want to compare lack and surplus quantities on different continents only. So our work is stopped on comparison, and there isn't any proposal. So, the next step was the comparison of lack and waste in Africa.

9. In the discussion and conclusion sections you only repeat the results that were presented in the section 3. In the discussion, I think you need to explain the results, the reasons behind the results, the relations with other studies, and what can be inferred by the results. In the conclusion, unfortunately you repeat again the results by using points. I think the conclusion should be shorter as it only discussed about summary of the results, should be discussed the limitation of the study (was already written in the paper), possible future studies, and recommendations. Therefore, you need to improve both sections.

We did.

10. Some minor revisions are: (1) all abbreviations should be explained when they firstly appear in the text (2) you can write et al. instead of mentioning his colleagues or her co-authors etc.

We did, thanks!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

This is an interesting and important paper.  The authors demonstrate (theoretically) that the food that is wasted is sufficient to eliminate hunger-related deaths. 

In the abstract, the authors state their primary research question as, "Is it true, theoretically, that if all produced and wasted food would be put available to feed the extreme poor hungry, we could reach zero hunger deaths?"  I think the paper would be stronger if it focused on this question exclusively and eliminated discussion of overconsumption and obesity.  This would mean that of the three hypotheses (lines 241 - 243), only H1 and H3 should be discussed.  

My reason for suggesting the elimination of H2 and the discussion of overconsumption and obesity is that obesity is more complicated than the authors assume.  The discussion presupposes the energy-balance model (weight gain = calories in less calories expended), but recent research has questioned this model (for summary discussion, see Julie Guthman's book Weighing In (Univ. California Press, 2011).)  Disease, medication, genetics, and environmental toxins (e.g. Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals) can all contribute to overweight and obesity.  

But the good thing is that the authors don't need the discussion of overconsumption and obesity.  The focus on food waste/food loss is important and the argument there is much stronger.  

An additional suggestion:  the abstract begins with a discussion of sustainable development, but there is only a smattering of discussion of sustainability throughout the paper.  I think more should be said about the connection between addressing food waste/loss and sustainability. 

A few small points:

Line 74:  "FLW" appears, undefined.  The authors should specify what this stands for the first time they introduce it.

Line 89:  The authors should explain what hidden hunger is.  Some readers may not know.  

Author Response

Dear Reviewers,

We sincerely thank you for your thorough and excellent work. I do not say this as a matter of politeness, but you really were in harmony that we wanted too much in one article, somewhat mashing external factors (food waste, due to inefficiency + excess profit maximization) and internal factors (obesity etc.) We deleted the latter and will work it our in a separate article. This was a painful procedure, shortening the article with 30% (from 23 to 16 pages), but we thank again for helping us to make our main message more clear and acceptable!

This is an interesting and important paper.  The authors demonstrate (theoretically) that the food that is wasted is sufficient to eliminate hunger-related deaths. 

In the abstract, the authors state their primary research question as, "Is it true, theoretically, that if all produced and wasted food would be put available to feed the extreme poor hungry, we could reach zero hunger deaths?"  I think the paper would be stronger if it focused on this question exclusively and eliminated discussion of overconsumption and obesity.  This would mean that of the three hypotheses (lines 241 - 243), only H1 and H3 should be discussed. 

Thank you, this was a hard decision, but we must agree. We deleted H2 and all related discussion, calculation, etc (altogether 2-3 pages). 

My reason for suggesting the elimination of H2 and the discussion of overconsumption and obesity is that obesity is more complicated than the authors assume.  The discussion presupposes the energy-balance model (weight gain = calories in less calories expended), but recent research has questioned this model (for summary discussion, see Julie Guthman's book Weighing In (Univ. California Press, 2011).)  Disease, medication, genetics, and environmental toxins (e.g. Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals) can all contribute to overweight and obesity. 

OK, you are right! We will work this out in a separate article, which will be a natural follow up on this. Anyway, one of us already had lectures about the “BMI for economics” (how to find ideal size for big companies instead of infinite growth), so it would be a natural combination. And yes, we cannot deal such an important and novel topic with a simplified view of BMI, somewhat obsolete now. Sorry, this fell out of our scope of expertise, as you rightly pointed out.

But the good thing is that the authors don't need the discussion of overconsumption and obesity.  The focus on food waste/food loss is important and the argument there is much stronger.  

An additional suggestion:  the abstract begins with a discussion of sustainable development, but there is only a smattering of discussion of sustainability throughout the paper.  I think more should be said about the connection between addressing food waste/loss and sustainability. 

OK, this is our main line of expertise, so we thought it is boring. But we put in some explanation at the very beginning of the intro: “Sustainability has many definitions and approaches. According to our worldview, sustainable development would be rather called ‘sustainable and humane development’ (SHD), which means we have to assure basic economic condition for a decent, or at least proper life for all people on Earth. It is not proper, that some people, especially children die in hunger and thirst, others fight with obesity. We should use science to find a balance to minimize food waste on the one extreme, and lack of food in the other.”

A few small points:

Line 74:  "FLW" appears, undefined.  The authors should specify what this stands for the first time they introduce it.

Done, thanks!

Line 89:  The authors should explain what hidden hunger is.  Some readers may not know.  

Lines 91-96 added: “Hidden hunger is defined as a form of undernutrition that occurs when intake and/or absorption of minerals, vitamins and other life-necessary microintergredients (e.g. iodine, zinc, iron) are not sufficient to assure proper health and development. Such a symptom might be caused by poor diet, more intensive micronutrient needs during certain life stages (e.g. pregnancy), and special health problems such as diseases, infections, or parasites.”

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I am satisfied with the revisions.  The authors addressed all of my concerns. 

Author Response

Thanks a lot, we appreciate your work and comments!