For the 2050 food production will have to increase by 70% to meet the food requirements of a population that is expected to grow by another 2.3 people. However, it will be a completely different question from the current one, about 70% of the world’s population in fact live in cities and urban areas, compared to the current 49%. It is estimated that the demand for food will continue to increase, as a result of the growth of the population and the increase in income.
The demand for cereals (for human food and livestock) is expected to reach about 3 billion tons in 2050, compared with 2.1 billion tons produced at present. The urban population will be on average richer and more sensitive to factors related to safety and food quality, as well as increasing attention to environmental issues such as water scarcity.
The production of 1 kg of beef meat for example requires the consumption of 15. 415 litres of water, to produce instead 1 kg of tomato are sufficient 250 liters of water. In this context, large financial and industrial groups around the world have started investing in agriculture, particularly in horticulture.
These investments are oriented both towards nurseries for the production of plants for the open field transplantation included in projects of supply chain for the fresh marked as for the transformed vegetables and in production companies of vegetable finished products greenhouses.