Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-01-02DOI: 10.1038/s43016-024-01102-x
Anneli Löfstedt, Bernhard Scheliga, Magaly Aceves-Martins, Baukje de Roos
{"title":"Seafood supply mapping reveals production and consumption mismatches and large dietary nutrient losses through exports in the United Kingdom","authors":"Anneli Löfstedt, Bernhard Scheliga, Magaly Aceves-Martins, Baukje de Roos","doi":"10.1038/s43016-024-01102-x","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01102-x","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Seafood can contribute towards healthy and sustainable food systems by improving public health and helping achieve net zero carbon emissions. Here, we provide a high-resolution perspective on UK seafood supplies and nutrient flows at the species level. We mapped seafood production (capture and aquaculture), trade (imports and exports), purchases (within and out of home) and seafood consumption between 2009 and 2020. UK dietary recommendations for finfish consumption were not achieved by domestic production nor national supplies. Mapping dietary nutrient flows revealed that the UK undergoes substantial losses of omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin B<sub>12</sub> and vitamin D, which could contribute 73%, 46% and 7% towards UK-recommended nutrient intakes, respectively, through exports of oily fish such as salmon, herring and mackerel. Policies should consider promoting greater consumption of locally produced oily fish species to improve public health and seafood system resilience.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142911924","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Multiplexed food-borne pathogen detection using an argonaute-mediated digital sensor based on a magnetic-bead-assisted imaging transcoding system","authors":"Zhipan Wang, Xinrui Cheng, Aimin Ma, Feng Jiang, Yiping Chen","doi":"10.1038/s43016-024-01082-y","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01082-y","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Accurate, sensitive and multiplexed detection of food-borne pathogens is crucial for assessing food safety risks. Here we present a digital DNA-amplification-free nucleic acid detection assay to achieve multiplexed and ultrasensitive detection of three food-borne pathogens. We used mesophilic <i>Clostridium butyricum</i> argonaute and ma<u>g</u>netic beads in a digital carrier system (d-MAGIC). <i>Clostridium butyricum</i> argonaute, with its two-guide accurate cleavage activity, precisely targets and cleaves fluorescence-quencher reporters corresponding to different bacteria through a two-step process. The system uses fluorescence-encoded magnetic beads as programmable multi-probes, allowing the simultaneous detection of multiple pathogens and easy data interpretation via artificial intelligence. The method showed a wide detection range (10<sup>1</sup> to 10<sup>7</sup> CFU ml<sup>−1</sup>) and a low limit of detection of 6 CFU ml<sup>−1</sup> for food-borne pathogens without DNA amplification. Digital nucleic acid testing using d-MAGIC can become a next-generation strategy for accurate and convenient pathogen detection.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"91 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142911928","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-01-02DOI: 10.1038/s43016-024-01088-6
Di Sheng, James A. Edmonds, Pralit Patel, Stephanie T. Waldhoff, Brian C. O’Neill, Marshall A. Wise, Xin Zhao
{"title":"Labour market evolution is a key determinant of global agroeconomic and environmental futures","authors":"Di Sheng, James A. Edmonds, Pralit Patel, Stephanie T. Waldhoff, Brian C. O’Neill, Marshall A. Wise, Xin Zhao","doi":"10.1038/s43016-024-01088-6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01088-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Long-term labour market evolution shapes agricultural transformation through labour productivity growth and labour market transitions. Despite its importance in agricultural production, labour has been overlooked when exploring the agrifood–water–environment–climate nexus. Here we incorporate evolving labour markets into multisector dynamic modelling to examine their agroeconomic and environmental implications. Our projections show that the recent decline of global agricultural employment persists, with an estimated decadal decrease of 43 million people by 2100, strengthening the decoupling of labour from production. Exploring scenarios with varying labour productivity and supply factors, we also show a positive relationship between productivity-adjusted labour supply and agricultural emissions, with more pronounced and heterogeneous regional and sectoral responses. While highlighting the pressing need to capture labour dynamics in integrated human–Earth systems, our study lays the foundation for further investigation into labour market responses and feedback in broader scenarios.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"339 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142911929","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"China’s municipal wastewater policies enhanced seafood safety and offset health risks from atmospheric mercury emissions in the past four decades","authors":"Xingrui Cai, Mengqi Yang, Maodian Liu, Yuang Chen, Chenghao Yu, Haoran Zhang, Qianru Zhang, Shijun Ma, Xinyu Dou, Jing Meng, Xuejun Wang","doi":"10.1038/s43016-024-01093-9","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01093-9","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The neurotoxin methylmercury in seafood threatens food safety worldwide. China has implemented stringent wastewater policies, established numerous treatment facilities and enforced rigorous water quality standards to address pollution in its waterways. However, the impact of these policies on seafood safety and methylmercury exposure remains unknown. Here we developed a process-based model showing that, although mercury reductions from municipal wastewater policies accounted for only 9% of atmospheric mercury emissions during 1980–2022, these measures unexpectedly prevented <span>({mathrm{102,000}}_{-mathrm{6,600}}^{+mathrm{11,000}})</span> mercury-related deaths and counteracted nearly two thirds of potential deaths from those emissions. Furthermore, these policies ensured that <span>({146}_{-9}^{+8})</span> megatonnes of freshwater seafood met the World Health Organization and China’s mercury-safety standards, preventing <span>({mathrm{US}}${498}_{-29}^{+32})</span> billion in economic losses. Finally, we explore how China, as the primary global seafood producer and exporter, could develop municipal wastewater policies at the regional level to reduce aquatic pollutants and unlock the health benefits of seafood consumption.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"15 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142911925","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature FoodPub Date : 2025-01-02DOI: 10.1038/s43016-024-01096-6
Thanh-Tung Nguyen, Matin Qaim
{"title":"Local and regional food production diversity are positively associated with household dietary diversity in rural Africa","authors":"Thanh-Tung Nguyen, Matin Qaim","doi":"10.1038/s43016-024-01096-6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01096-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Undernutrition and low dietary quality remain widespread issues in Africa. As most rural households in the region are involved in farming, the diversification of own farm production could improve their access to nutritious foods. Here we use representative panel data from six African countries to estimate this effect across different scales. We show that farm production diversity is positively associated with household dietary diversity—yet the average magnitude of the association is small, depends on the specific measure of production diversity and increases with distance from urban centres. In all countries, markets and market access are more important for dietary diversity than own production. Because village-, town- and district-level production diversity are often positively associated with dietary diversity, higher diversity on each individual farm may not be required. The appropriate spatial scale should be considered when designing diversification strategies.</p>","PeriodicalId":19090,"journal":{"name":"Nature Food","volume":"26 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2025-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142911926","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}