"What are the main issues for policy-makers to consider when linking climate change on the one hand and food security and nutrition on the other, in particular when designing, formulating and implementing policies and programmes?"
Increasing solar UV-B radiation is a dimension of climate change that has many adverse consequences, including immune suppression, genetic mutation and abnormal cell division. Crop failures, forest death, increasedt solubility of toxic metals and soil microbe damage are also associated with increasing UV-B radiation.
In addition to implementing biogenic strategies for mitigating increases in UV-B, it is relevant to consider a proactive, nutritional approach to prevention and treatment of the diseases that are linked to increasing UV-B. [1]
Since "DNA Day" is celebrated each year in April, it is especially timely to consider the role of Cannabis seed nutrition in repairing damaged DNA, before the Spring planting season for 2015 passes. [2,3, 4, 5]
Cannabis "hemp" seed is the best available source of vegetable protein for the greatest number of people in the world, comprised of 65% edestin protein and 35% albumin protein. Protein production determines carrying capacity.
Political interference has impeded open discussion of the many reasons to recognize hemp as a critically important crop. Our species does not have time for suppressed response to the global threat of climate change. All solutions to the compounding problems must be considered, without regard to outdated policies that continue to limit open discussion of an overlooked and under-utilized, "strategic" natural asset. [6]
References
1. Climatology of Ultraviolet Radiation at High Latitudes Derived from Measurements of the National Science Foundation’s Ultraviolet Spectral Irradiance Monitoring Network
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-03313-1_3
"Measurements of solar UV irradiance performed during the last 18 years at six high-latitude locations and San Diego have revealed large differences of the sites’ UV climates. The ozone hole has a large effect on the UV Index at the three Antarctic sites, and to a lesser extent at Ushuaia. UV Indices measured at South Pole during the ozone hole period are on average 20%-80% larger than measurements at comparable solar elevations during summer months. When the ozone hole passed over Palmer Station late in the year, the UV Index was as high as 14.8 and exceeded the maximum UV Index of 12.0 observed at San Diego."
2. DNA Day 2015
http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/spotlight/dna-day-2015
3.Hemp can repair DNA
http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2012/09/hemp-can-repair-dna-2-2471364.html
4. Molecular characterization of edestin gene family in Cannabis sativa L
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25280223
5. National Library of Medicine - Medical Subject Headings.
Name of Substance edestin protein, Cannabis sativa
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/cgi/mesh/2011/MB_cgi?mode=&index=161552
6. Executive Order 13603
PART VIII - GENERAL PROVISIONSSec. 801. Definitions. (e) "Food resources" means all commodities and products, (simple, mixed, or compound), or complements to such commodities or products, that are capable of being ingested by either human beings or animals, irrespective of other uses to which such commodities or products may be put, at all stages of processing from the raw commodity to the products thereof in vendible form for human or animal consumption. "Food resources" also means potable water packaged in commercially marketable containers, all starches, sugars, vegetable and animal or marine fats and oils, seed, cotton, hemp, and flax fiber, but does not mean any such material after it loses its identity as an agricultural commodity or agricultural product.
Mr. Paul von Hartmann