Topic description and stories

How 'more food per field' could help save our wild spaces

28 Jan 2016

Increased farm yields could help to spare land from agriculture for natural habitats that benefit wildlife and store greenhouse gases, but only if...

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Haua Fteah, Cyrenaica, Libya.  ̽»¨Ö±²¥cave’s entrance.

Let’s go wild: how ancient communities resisted new farming practices

06 Jan 2016

Analysis of grinding stones reveals that North African communities may have moved slowly and cautiously from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to more...

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Millet: the missing piece in the puzzle of prehistoric humans’ transition from hunter-gatherers to farmers

14 Dec 2015

New research shows a cereal familiar today as birdseed was carried across Eurasia by ancient shepherds and herders laying the foundation, in...

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Vast pivot irrigator shows farming encroaching on wilderness in New Zealand.

Paying farmers to help the environment works, but ‘perverse’ subsidies must be balanced

09 Sep 2015

First analysis of effectiveness of agri-environment schemes measured at a national level suggests that they work, but are still a drop in the ocean...

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Hunter-gatherer bone mass (left) compared with agriculturalist bone mass (right)

Hunter-gatherer past shows our fragile bones result from physical inactivity since invention of farming

22 Dec 2014

Latest analysis of prehistoric bones show there is no anatomical reason why a person born today could not develop the skeletal strength of a...

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Implications for Energy

Understanding the implications of climate change for business

05 Sep 2014

A new online resource, which summarises the implications of climate change for specific sectors of the economy, has been produced and made freely...

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Fajitas. Banner image: ...eat meat! by James Vaughn

Changing global diets is vital to reducing climate change

01 Sep 2014

Healthier diets and reducing food waste are part of a combination of solutions needed to ensure food security and avoid dangerous climate change, say...

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Agriculture

Two million hectare shortfall in UK land possible by 2030, study finds

26 Jun 2014

Cambridge-hosted industry platform calls for joint action plan with government

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Lets Play a Game:)!

New EU reforms fail European wildlife

05 Jun 2014

Despite political proclamation of increased environmental focus, experts argue that the European Union’s recent agricultural reforms are far too weak...

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Ship loading at the Cargill Elevator

Agricultural markets and the Great Depression: lessons from the past

07 May 2014

Seventy five years ago, the publication of John Steinbeck's novel ̽»¨Ö±²¥Grapes of Wrath shocked the world with its description of starvation in the...

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Agriculture is the backbone of India

New evidence of suicide epidemic among India’s ‘marginalised’ farmers

17 Apr 2014

Latest statistical research finds strong causal links between areas with the most suicides and areas where impoverished farmers are trying to grow...

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From athletes to couch potatoes: humans through 6,000 years of farming

08 Apr 2014

Research into lower limb bones shows that our early farming ancestors in Central Europe became less active as their tasks diversified and technology...

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