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BBC Inside Science: Global food security during Ukraine conflict

10/06/2021

Global food security during Ukraine conflict

BBC Radio 4 - BBC Inside Science, Global food security during Ukraine conflict

Food supply risks; lead poisoning in birds; Covid monitoring; Artemis mission to moon.

We discuss possible food shocks of the Ukraine conflict, lead poisoning in birds, the future of Covid monitoring, and a landmark moment in the plan to return humans to the moon.

The Russian conflict in Ukraine is already causing hunger there, and as Ukraine and Russia are huge grain exporters, the crisis will be far reaching. Food prices everywhere are expected to rise, and there’s fear that the war could affect food supplies in some of the poorest parts of the world. Tim Lang, Emeritus Professor of Food Policy at City University of London, and Dr Hannah Ritchie, Head of Research at the website Our World in Data, join us to discuss food security. 

Lead is highly toxic to humans and other animals. One source of lead in the environment is the bullets and shot used to hunt wild game, and new research shows that lead shot has a significant effect on birds of prey such as eagles, buzzards and vultures across the whole of Europe. One of the study’s authors, Professor Debbie Pain, explains the research. 

Many of us have spent the past two years anxiously following Covid graphs, but from next month the government is cutting funding to several surveillance programmes. Mass free testing will also end, though the Office for National Statistics survey will continue. Given that case numbers are rising, is reduced monitoring wise? Professor Adam Kucharski from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine discusses how important surveillance has been in the pandemic. 

The last crewed mission to the Moon was half a century ago, and no one has made that one small step since. But a new NASA programme aims to change that, and tonight is the rollout of Artemis I, the first stage on a journey to return humans to the moon, including the first woman on the moon and the first person of colour on the moon. BBC science correspondent Jon Amos paints a picture of what we’ll see tonight.

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