Denis Murphy, Helen Woodfield and Graham Brookes

The Earth’s population is expected to grow to 9.7 billion over the next 33 years, and that’s a huge exponential growth rate. We only hit our first billion total in 1800. All in all, it adds up to a lot of mouths to feed, especially when you consider the vast hunger issues that certain parts of the world face today. How can this be done both sustainably and reliably without destroying our planet? Do we ‘simply’ need to produce more food? Or is it more important to sort out distribution networks, develop new technological solutions to keeping food fresh, and cut down on waste? Denis Murphy is Professor of biotechnology at University of South Wales, Helen Woodfield is a lecturer at Cardiff University's School of Biosciences and Graham Brookes is an agricultural economist. Chaired by Jonathon Harrington.