15th World Congress of food Science and Technolgy

August 22-26 2010. Cape Town, South Africa . 15th IUFoST Congress. Over 1700 delegates participated at this Congress and a total of 220 oral presentations and over 800 posters contributed to making it a world class event.

The five-day conference, arranged by the International Union of Food Science & Technology (IUFoST), is the world's leading food science conference, and has attracted top researchers, policy makers, and food companies from 79 countries to discuss the latest developments in producing and storing food.

"This international body (the IUFoST) needs to be acting in the way the International Panel on Climate Change did and go to the UN and say we need action to conserve the ecosystem services that the world produces," said Sir David, who is now director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford.

Ecosystem services is a term used to describe the benefits we get from ecosystems such as grazing land and fresh water.

Global demand for food is expected to increase 50% by 2050, driven by population growth and a better standard of living for more people in emerging economies such as SA, Brazil, China and Mexico, said Sir David. "We can manage it, provided society understands how," he said, warning that the ecosystem challenges facing the world could not be dealt with in isolation.

The challenge of increasing food production would take place amidst global warming and greater water scarcity, particularly in Africa, he said. "Food production per litre of water is going to have to increase. "

Professor Linus Opara of the South African Chair in Postharvest Technology, Stellenbosch University, South Africa gave a presentation on "Mapping and reducing postharvest food losses: the overlooked strategy in addressing food and nutritional security."