The impetus to achieve food security as well as environmental quality without undermining economic growth and development has been highly prioritized as a subject of debate by nations recently. Food security and environmental sustainability are two concepts that are directly or indirectly linked to other Sustainable Development Goals [
6,
14,
29,
36]. These concepts help to end hunger and provide employment opportunities that can help to achieve zero poverty as well as environmental sustainability with the proper control of pollution, carbon emissions, and greenhouse gas emissions. Food security is a tool through which sustenance and the achievement of the SDGs can be attained for future generations because food security enhances good nutrition, which helps brain development and productivity, and helps in supplying sustainable food to the entire global population [
18]. This study provides insight to help various decision-makers, nations, policymakers, governments, investors, companies, and other stakeholders see food security as a major tool to help nations attain various objectives. There is a need to see food security as important to life and to re-direct policies that can help countries across the globe see the need to achieve food security at all costs [
37]. The significance of this study is that food security metamorphized to help nations achieve other SDGs and other objectives that are outside the 17 goals. Theoretically, food security, economic growth, and development in relation to environmental control have been widely related to the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) theory [
9,
27]. The theory connects economic and environmental issues together, as earlier used by other researchers [
38,
39]. Many leaders of nations have the urge and desire for economic growth and development, but this desire has increased pollution and environmental degradation. However, with adequate policies and regulations in place, sustainable economic growth and development are earned. Therefore, the theory asserts that environmental quality is attained at a turning point where pollution and other environmental damages are at a minimum, in exchange for sustainable food security, economic growth, and development. This affirms an inverted U-shaped relationship existing between economic development and environmental quality. On the other hand, food security and sustainable development are supported by the concept of the Sustainable Development Goals. This study believes that achieving food security at a national level would help global food security targets. Therefore, food security has a strong link with most other SDGs and thereby metamorphized to help in achieving other SDGs [
9]. The next aspect of this study is the general review of the related literature.
The study by [
9] explored the impact of food security on environmental degradation using GMMs estimation, and the results revealed that the level of environmental damage tends to be higher with higher levels of food security. The authors of [
26] studied the impact of livestock on environmental pollution, and the results revealed that livestock farming has contributed to environmental pollution globally. The authors of [
40] assessed the demand and supply of food and the role of trade and stock management in achieving food security, and the findings revealed that stock management, price, and distribution enhance food security, while limited producers and the volatility of world markets are major problems facing global food security. The authors of [
41] studied the consequences of the global food supply yield gaps, environmental quality, and food security, revealing that the degree of closing yield gaps enhances food security with unclear impacts on environmental quality, but food security influences the quality of the environment. Moreover, ref. [
29] investigated bio-fuel impacts on food security in 51 developing countries using GMMs, and revealed a positive and significant relationship between environmental quality and food security. The researchers suggested that improvements in the consumption of bio-fuel increase food security and sustain environmental quality. Furthermore, ref. [
42] reviewed the historical trends of crop production in China and examined constraints against increases in crop production, revealing that the challenges facing sciences and technology are major setbacks to environmental quality and protection. The authors of [
19] constructed a multi-objective optimization model to ensure food security, environmental protection, and greenhouse gas emission reduction for sustainable development. Their results revealed that it is impossible to achieve the three objectives through the adjustment of chemical fertilizer structures within a short period. Moreover, ref. [
12] evaluated the impact and adaptation strategies with a coupled modeling framework, and the result revealed that the impacts of climate change on food security and environmental quality are negatively related. The authors of [
27] empirically examined the effect of agricultural development on carbon emissions in Ghana using regression, variance decomposition, and causality analysis. The results revealed a U-shaped relationship between agricultural development and carbon emissions that employed the EKC hypothesis rejection and found Structural Adjustment Programs as a moderating effect. Furthermore, [
30] assessed the effect of globalization on the ecological footprint using the Method of Moments Quantile Regression (MMQR) approach. The results revealed that the effect of globalization on the ecological footprint is positive and technological innovation helps in achieving sustainability. The authors of [
33] reviewed the literature on the impact of soil, water, and air quality, suggesting that a majority of results from scholars revealed that intensive agricultural activities negatively impacted all the variables. Moreover, ref. [
43] addressed the challenges facing the achievement of sustainable livestock, and suggested a feed technology, a sound business plan, an improved health source, and an improved feed approach. The authors of [
32] investigated the relationship between agricultural carbon emission efficiency and food security using the super slack-based model (Super-SBM) and the comprehensive index method. The regression result revealed an inconsistency with a decreasing trend and a significant relationship with relatively stable food security in the region. Moreover, ref. [
6] studied food security and environmental sustainability by proposing an efficient strategy to reduce and recycle food loss and waste, and revealed that much food loss and waste occurred at every stage of the supply chain, which threatened food security and environmental sustainability. The authors of [
44] studied the environmental implication of remittances to households and economic advancements using FMOLSs, DOLSs, and CCR estimators, with results revealing that remittances, population growth, and energy use contribute to poor ecological quality in Ghana through increases in carbon emissions. Technological innovation does improve ecological quality with bi-directional causality between remittance and C0
2 emissions, with no directional relation with others. Furthermore, ref. [
14] presented a systemic analysis of the causes and impacts of environmental costs for China’s cropping and crop-based livestock system on nitrogen management. The results revealed that expansion and intensive livestock production over the last 10 years was a serious cause of direct and indirect air and water pollution, which has posed a major threat to agriculture in China’s environment. The authors of [
36] examined the asymmetrical impact of agriculture, fossil fuel consumption, and food security on carbon emissions in Pakistan using the ADF approach, and the outcome revealed a long-term asymmetrical relationship between the variables. Further results showed that increases in population and fossil fuel and carbon emissions worsen environmental standards. Moreover, ref. [
37] investigated the effect of economic policy uncertainty on carbon emissions, and the results revealed a negative and insignificant impact on carbon emissions, but EPU showed a positive relationship between environmental regulation and carbon emissions. The authors of [
45] explored the link between fossil fuel energy consumption, industrial value added, and carbon emissions in G20 countries using the CS-ARDL estimator, and the results showed that sources of carbon emissions in G20 countries vary slightly in advanced countries compared to emerging countries. Further findings revealed that FDI, R&D, ICT, trade openness, and government expenditure on health and education improve carbon emissions. Furthermore, ref. [
23] studied the impact of FDI, urbanization, energy consumption, technological innovation, and financial development on carbon emissions in G8 economies. The findings showed a strong cross-sectional dependency. Further findings revealed a bi-directional causality among trade openness, financial development, economic growth, carbon emissions, and energy use, while a unidirectional causal relationship between carbon emission and FDI was found. The author of [
5] examined the role of ecosystem services in rural food security through three dimensions, and the result revealed that the ecosystem supports each of these three dimensions (availability, utilization of food, and access) either directly or indirectly. Moreover, ref. [
16] examined the impact of agricultural technologies on carbon emissions using panel ARDL, and the results revealed the existence of cointegration among the variables. Further results revealed that economic growth and pesticides are positively and significantly related to C0
2 emissions in the long run, but only economic growth revealed a positive effect on C0
2 emissions in the short run. The authors of [
7] reviewed the impact of climate change on agriculture and the mitigation measures to reduce GHG emissions and further outlined the challenges of feeding 10 billion people in the future. They suggested that countries should continue to embark on policies that would help to mitigate or reduce emission rates. Moreover, ref. [
46] identified agriculture, environment, human, and multi-disciplinary studies as the factors influencing climate changes that are adversely affecting Nigeria’s environment. The study was conducted through a systematic standard and bibliographic review approach to analyze trends of past studies on climate change. The authors of [
47] studied the impact of economic policy uncertainty on carbon emissions using the PMG-ARDL modeling approach and revealed that the world uncertainty index affects CO
2 emissions in both the short run and the long run. Furthermore, ref. [
28] studied the extent to which CO
2 emission reduction, bio-energy production, and afforestation affect food security and agricultural market conditions. The results revealed that afforestation impacts food security and non-carbon emission policies such as emission taxes are a major risk of hunger in 2050. Moreover, ref. [
48] examined the impact of population growth, ecological footprint, energy consumption, and natural resources on CO
2 emissions using GMMs, GLMs, and Robust Least Squares, and the findings revealed an inverse relationship between renewable energy consumption and natural resources with CO
2 emissions and ecological footprint. Further results showed that population growth and non-renewable energy consumption improve environmental quality, while non-renewable energy consumption increases environmental degradation. The authors of [
49] studied and analyzed the relationship between the effect of agricultural carbon emission reduction and agricultural product supply in order to predict the decomposing state of agricultural products. The results revealed that green technology innovation, agricultural carbon emission, and product supply in China have significant spatial differences auto-correlated with an inverted U-shaped relationship. Moreover, ref. [
2] promoted a water–energy–food nexus as a strong conceptual tool for achieving sustainable development, and suggested that accounting for food–energy–water provided a strong nexus between livelihood and sustainable development. Furthermore, ref. [
50] developed an integrated model relating to food security for predictive analysis to meet both current and future socioeconomic demands for sustainable development. Their study revealed that the model was capable of solving multi-period socioeconomic problems and predicting future managerial problems.
The general findings from the literature revealed that extant studies on food security, economic growth, and environmental sustainability are few, and the majority are non-empirical. Many prior studies revealed that food security influences environmental quality by contributing to environmental degradation [
6,
9,
14,
26]. It was discovered that food security that helps to grow sustainably without undermining environmental quality, as well as economic development for sustainable development, is difficult to attain [
19]. This has generated intense discord that needs urgent attention in the world literature [
11,
19,
22,
29], which necessitated this research work. No researchers have conducted an in-depth study on the relationship between food security and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, based on this study’s literature review findings. Studies on food security tend towards economic growth, the water–energy–food nexus, and the environment, and their findings have been mixed in the world literature. While some scholars found positive relationships, others found negative results [
2,
32,
50]. Meanwhile, many scholars found that the achievement of food security destroys the environment, while others are of the opinion that the achievement of food security with advanced agricultural technology and innovation with good policies and regulations improves environmental quality [
16,
23]. However, there seems to be consensus that food security boosts economic growth and development [
5,
8], although many studies in this class are non-empirical [
36,
50]. In addition, prior studies on food security and environmental sustainability generally have mixed results, which this study clarifies by adding to the body of knowledge in this regard. Food security helps to grow sustainability by helping and strengthening various means of achieving other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) [
9]. The next stage of this study is the graphical representation of how food security is related to the SDGs.