The Role of Analytical Chemistry in Agrofood

The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World program for sustainable development presents a transformative vision, recognizing that our planet is changing, bringing with it new challenges that must be overcome if we want to live in a world without hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition, in any of its forms. At the same time, there is a direct relationship between the quality of food and health. The production of high-quality food in high quantities is an emerging concern. However, the challenges are enormous, as demonstrated by the following: i) there is a demand for food production, occurring amid a declining rural labor force; ii) there is an increasing amount of raw material production (e.g., biomass generated) for a market that has been only mildly explored; iii) there is a lack of simpler and cheaper analytical alternatives to apply in undeveloped countries, whose developments is highly dependent of agriculture; and iv) there is the necessity to adopt more efficient and sustainable production methods that are adapted to climate change. On almost all these fronts, the field of analytical chemistry has a lot to contribute.