The agri-food sector faces many significant challenges today, with climate change being paramount. Climate change manifests through extreme weather events, droughts, floods, and frosts, which reduce productivity and incomes and discourage the involvement of younger generations in primary production. At the same time, environmental impacts from the excessive use of natural resources and pollution from pesticides and fertilizers, as well as the reduction of arable land and deforestation for new developments, make the sustainability of agriculture the most critical challenge of our time. We must not overlook that the increase in the global population, the continuously growing demand for food, and changes in dietary habits combined with rising living standards in many countries around the world, strain the adequate and safe production of food. Along with the increasing frequency of diseases in animals and plants, these factors pose critical challenges to the supply chain and overall food security

 

The global society has not yet found an overall effective policy to address social and economic inequalities in many regions of the world. Primary production continuously squeezes its profit and, in many cases, fails to serve the purpose for which it exists, while the majority of the profit ends up with intermediaries and retail sales, resulting in the continuous compression of consumers’ disposable income. Partly, this is also due to limited and unequal access to modern technologies and markets for all farmers and producers, especially in developing countries, creating inequalities and difficulties in the further development of the agri-food sector. Additionally, changes in legislation and the continuously increasing requirements regarding food safety and environmental protection create new challenges for producers and businesses.