Glossary

-agriculture: intentional cultivation of animals, plants, fungi, and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life (Source).

-entitlements: access to the means to get access to food, usually either through land and ability to grow it or income (cash) and ability to buy it on markets.

-extensification: in agriculture, a production system that uses small inputs of labor, fertilizers,and capital relative to the land area being farmed. In other words, increasing production yields by increasing the area of land being cultivated (Source).

-famine: a widespread scarcity of food for a given population, usually leading to disease and death (or out-migration) in the population (Source).

-food: any substance that can be eaten or drunk for nutrition or pleasure (Source).

-food desert: any area in the industrialized world where healthy, affordable food is difficult to obtain (Source).

-food security: refers to the availability of food and one's access to it. A household is considered food secure when its occupants do not live in hunger or fear of starvation (Source). Related terms include food access (resources to obtain foods for a nutritious diet) and food utilization (proper biological use of food).

-food system: includes all processes and infrastructure involved in feeding a population: growing, harvesting, processing, packaging, transporting, marketing, consumption, and disposal of food and food-related items (Source).

-Green Revolution: the intentional, Western science-based intensification of maize, wheat, potato, and rice yields from the 1960s onward. The majority of the revolution took place in Asia and Latin America and introduced hybrid plant varieties, fossil-fuel based fertilizer, chemical pesticides and herbicides, and irrigation to formerly natural agricultural areas (Source).

-industrial food: production, processing and distribution of "food" (commodities, nutrients, food products) on a mass scale using principles of industrial manufacturing (economies of scale, specialization, efficiency). Emerged in the 19th century in the US and Europe to feed an urban, industrial workforce. Heavily reliant on cheap fossil fuels.

-intensification: in agriculture, a production system characterized by high inputs of capital, labor, or heavy usage of technologies relative to the land area being farmed. In other words, increasing production yields on a given area of land (Source).

-malnutrition: the condition that results from taking an unbalanced diet in which certain nutrients are lacking, in excess, or in the wrong proportions (Source).