Failure to treat water as a strategic, valuable, and limited resource is a direct threat to the global economy; the health of our planet; and the well-being of both current and future generations of humanity.
About 70 percent of the water humans use globally is consumed by agriculture, and a full third of the greenhouse gas emissions we produce come from food production.
Ending hunger and chronic malnutrition remains within our grasp. However, we must recognize that there is a global reversal of a decades-long downward trend in the number of hungry people.
Chicago native Ertharin Cousin, 60, returned home in April as a distinguished fellow of global food and agriculture at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.
In the book The Last Hunger Season, the intimate dramas of farmers' lives unfold amidst growing awareness that to feed the world's growing population, food production must double by 2050.
