1)
The deepening of the concept is welcome, but it would be good to rethink the inclusion of sustainability as a dimension. It may be better approached by consistently having sustainability in its three dimensions integrated into the concept of food system: as “sustainable food systems”. If it would be kept as a dimension, it needs to be clear that it concerns both environmental, social and economic sustainability. In the draft, it is in some places only referring to environmental sustainability. See more on this in the attached comments.
Food safety could be more explicit.
Figure 2 does not add any value and should be removed.
2)
The analysis of the evolution is helpful to the reader, but needs to be adjusted. It should be clear in the text that availability, including quantity, continues to be important, together with quantity and the other dimensions. It is fundamental and highly context specific. See e.g. the food gap analysis in the 2018 WRI-report Creating a Sustiainable Food Future. The way the chapter 2.2. is written now, the narrative could fuel the trends of deagrarisation, reduced investments to agriculture and agricultural research, difficulties to attract youth to agriculture etc., which is surely not the intention. It must also be clear that the increased focus on quality encompasses quality of food and production – in some places it is stated only as quality of production.
Suggestions:
Add “Sole” or “only” to Table 1 i) “Sole focus on quantity of food produced”.
Remove the first figure 3
Paragraph 2.2. iii adjust the first sentence to: “The shift from only focusing on agricultural development to a more holistic “food systems” approach…”
3)
Section 3.2 on climate change – The wheat example is very specific and a bit out of place. It would be better to use references from larger scientific reviews of several studies and products such as the IPCC-land report (which is cited further down in the same paragraph).
Section 3.5 on the balance feed/food/fuel – Here it may be relevant to add the issue of the rapidly increasing interest in carbon capture and climate compensation through tree planting. Both the aspects of rights of local communities, as well as the trade-off between different objectives (food/feed/fuel/carbon capture). In this section it would also be relevant to mention the risks of relying too heavily on food import.
Section 3.9 digital revolution
Rephrase / improve examples. Precision agriculture is not only for crops but also for other types of farming including livestock. Gene editing is today very relevant both for crops and livestock.
4)
It may be more appropriate call the sections “entry points” instead of “initiatives”. I.e. “availability as an entry point” instead of “availability-focused initiatives”.
In general – increased diversification in farming systems could be highlighted more in different parts of the report. One highly interesting example that you may want to raise is the diversifying farming for increased sustainability as studied in the UNISECO-program https://gis-slu.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Cascade/index.html?appid=b115968b36c4445db96c4c077261a719
5)
Although acroecology is an important approach, it would be beneficial to the report to increase the diversity and highlight different approaches that can contribute to a sustainable food system.
Sara Gräslund