Might it be possible to make better plants more quickly than we do today? And without the public objection that accompanies genetic manipulation? Climate change means that this is now an urgent question.

Many people in Europe are critical of genetically modified (GM) food, due to safety concerns. A Eurobarometer survey, published in 2010, revealed that the European public tends to be worried on a “mediate level” about GM food , with people in Austria being particularly concerned.

Scientist Peter Freeman is managing a project that is probing the clock and metabolism of plants, called TiMet . Partners to the project include star biologists in the Germany, Spain, Switzerland and the UK, all working to gain better insights into what make plants tick.

Climate change and socio-economic factors are interdependent . If agriculture intensifies in a particular region, that would have an impact on water sector, resulting from the irrigation use.

Algae are an interesting natural resource because they proliferate quickly. They are not impinging on food production. And they need nothing but sunlight and a bit of waste water to grow on.

Most of the animal proteins found in the meat industry waste have, until now, been underutilised. The challenge is to transform such waste into food of higher functionality and added value .

We know when something is valuable to our everyday lives. We do not need a price tag. This is precisely what the HighARCS project attempts to do:  to measure the socio-economic value of ecosystem services , but without counting in euros, renminbi or dollars.

Making food and drink production for more than 500 million people more eco-friendly is a key policy in Europe. About 99% of all agro-food companies in the European Union are small and medium size enterprises (SME).

Livestock produces a lot of waste. One solution is to turn such agricultural waste into biogas to generate energy .  It requires using so-called anaerobic digestion, which consists in breaking down biodegradable material in the absence of oxygen.

The European Commission, on 29 th April 2013, slapped a two-year ban on insecticides suspected of killing off bee colonies. This follows the European Food Safety Authority finding that they pose a high acute risk to honey bees.

Marco Lodesani is the director of the honey bee and silkworm unit at the Agricultural Research Council (CRA-API) in Bologna, Italy. He coordinated Apenet , one of the first study highlighting the role of neonicotinoids in Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).

The amount of nitrogen that is excreted by livestock is directly proportional to the amount it is fed . This is according to Chris Reynolds a researcher in nutritional physiology of ruminants  at  the University of Reading , UK.

Food processing of cereal and fruits creates a rather voluminous amount of by-products . The London, UK-based Institution of Mechanical Engineers recently estimated that anywhere between 35% and 50%--or 1.

Riots, political instability and a spike in malnourishment cases blighted the years 2007 and 2008, particularly in developing countries.

It is not obvious when examining a wrapped lettuce or a microwavable bowl of Chinese soup. But plastic food packaging is made of multiple layers designed to act as a barrier for oxygen or bacteria .

Seaweeds are not only tasty, but they are a source of nutrients that could be beneficial for health and wellbeing. And like terrestrial plants, seaweeds also contain significant portions of fibre that reach the colon undigested.

Forests and land ecosystems are the earth’s carbon reservoirs. They are key to limit the impact of greenhouse gases, as they fix those gases down.

Lars Ove Dragsted, professor in preventive nutrition at the University of Copenhagen , Denmark, took part in a wide ranging EU funded project, called ISAFRUIT , designed to boost Europeans’ consumption of fruits and ultimately improve their health.

Peanut, egg and soy are more common food known to trigger an allergic reaction, a problem affecting around 8% of children in the EU. Intuitively, you might not list apples as causing allergic reactions.

Suzanne Dickson is a Professor of physiology and neuroendocrinology at the Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology, based at the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg ,  Sweden.