By Frieder Haenisch and Anna Gould
 
When people in developed countries think about food security, their considerations are usually very different from those of people in developing countries, whose concerns are generally quite fundamental, with questions like: is food available, is food affordable and does it cover my basic nutrition needs? These questions of food security are not new: food security was defined by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in 1974. The FAO defines food security as a status when “all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food which meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life.”
 
Indeed, the topic of food security is so important that it is recognized as one of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which aims to “halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger” (Target 1.C). Political leaders from 150 countries committed to achieve this goal, along with seven others, at the UN Millennium Summit in September 2000.
 
However, how far has the global community come in 2015 on the way to ensuring food security for humanity?
 
According to the official numbers from the FAO, we have come quite far. Their report Food Insecurity in the World 2014 states: “The vast majority of hungry people live in developing regions, which saw a 42 percent reduction in the prevalence of undernourished people between 1990–92 and 2012–14.” 

Some criticisms of this report have been raised, alleging that the 42 percent reduction in undernourishment was achieved by creative statistics and a modification of critical definitions. For example, Thomas Pogge, Director of the Global Justice Program at Yale University, argued in an interview that the UN aimed to reduce the number of chronically undernourished people by 50 percent in 1996, but this aim was amended in the 2000 resolution by modifying the goal to only reduce the proportion of the world population by 50 percent. In addition, Pogge argues that the FAO's definition of undernourishment is limited in that it only takes into account the daily calorie intake but not access to vitamins and proteins. Hence, a number of questions arise on how far we have come in the fight against hunger in the world. But nevertheless, it becomes clear that hunger is still a grand challenge for the world to solve.
 
Fortunately, around the world, many young, innovative and passionate people are trying to find solutions to tackle food insecurity with sustainable, easy-to-implement, regional solutions.

In February 2015, the Thought for Food (TFF) Global Summit was held in Lisbon, Portugal. The two-day event included the final round of a worldwide student business plan competition, the TFF Challenge. A total of 336 teams from over 300 universities in 51 countries entered the competition to present their solutions on how to feed 9 billion people. The ten finalist teams pitched their business plans and competed for seed funding to translate their vision into reality.  The winning team InnoVision presented a concept of a solar power food and vegetable storage system to increase the shelf-life of food.
 
Events like the TFF challenge are providing an excellent platform for young people with innovative ideas to connect and to start making a real impact on grand challenges like food security. Other global summits, like the first global leadership summit in biotechnology, the GapSummit, run by the student organization Global Biotech Revolution, provide a platform to challenge leaders of today and to empower the leaders of tomorrow to challenge the status quo. With a new generation of dynamic, well-connected leaders, we can start to build a better future.
 
 
Frieder Haenisch is Chief Operating Officer of Global Biotech Revolution. Anna Gould is Vice President of GapSummit 2016.