If ever there was a clarion call for change, this is it. Two weeks ago the British government-commissioned UK Global Food and Farming Futures report was released.

It arrived with little mainstream media fanfare, which is not unexpected. Bad news about humankind's future, on what's left of our planet, is simply not as instantly gratifying as the latest celebrity scandal or milk payout prophecy.

Drawing on the findings of over 400 experts from 35 countries, the report focuses on the challenges of global food security given the looming confluence of overpopulation, climate change and diminishing resources.

Governments around the world are quietly, but actively, taking note, even if the media are generally not. They know in their bones that a lack of food security and large price rises are not good for political stability. Hungry hordes tend to look around for scapegoats and heads on spikes.

The report highlights the fact that half the world's population already have sub-optimal diets. A billion are hungry, another billion suffer from malnourishment and the rest, in the West, are over- consuming. It urges a total transformation on the scale of the industrial revolution if we have any hope at all of avoiding huge environmental and social consequences.

It also emphasises in detail the unsustainability of current agricultural systems. Farmers globally are now facing the extremely complex problem of trying to produce ever more food, on increasingly limited land while using fewer resources. All at the same time as they will be attempting to lower their significant contribution to climate change. A very tall order.

Overpopulation is the elephant in the room. Currently, on average, there are 350,000 babies born each day as against around 100,000 deaths. So a million new global citizens every four days and exponentially that leads us to somewhere between 8-9 billion people on the planet by 2050 - barring a fortuitous meteorite strike or some such. The good news is that it is expected to level out from that point, but the damage will have been done.

The same for climate change. Russia's drought last year has impacted massively on global wheat supplies because they, some would say sensibly, enacted a ban on all wheat exports in an effort to insulate themselves. Now they find themselves importing some.

Pakistan's floods were devastating on their rice yields. In the flooded regions eating meat and drinking milk is largely non- existent now as most cattle were carried away in the deluge.

Queensland, Victoria and Tasmania all face huge crop losses as a direct result of their recent floods, with the extent yet to be fully assessed. It isn't rosy though, and it was made worse after Cyclone Yasi ripped through northern Queensland this week.

Whether you're a climate change denier or not these increasingly severe and frequent weather events are forever changing the food business.

The report also stressed that the complete collapse of the world's fisheries is now entirely possible if meaningful action is less than immediate. It points out that many marine systems are severely damaged by overfishing and that bycatch is a perfect example of the crisis of global food wastage. Indeed, 30 per cent of all food on the planet is estimated to be wasted.

All in all the report is a vast, wide-ranging and important 211-page read.

It does come up with a constructive and well-researched action plan. It logically, given the crisis we (and/or our children and grandchildren) face, does not rule out any method to achieve a workable solution. Some are arguable, like utilising GM crops and exterminating three billion people. Nah, I just made that last one up.

In the end, though, we all know that governments will need to talk to the economists before any action is even remotely considered in any seriousness. They may as well consult with astrologists to see how their week will pan out with the moon in Sagittarius.

The quandary, as always, is that economists universally espouse the retarded notion that there are no limits to growth and resources. They even do this with a straight face. The general populace tend to suck it up like it's gospel and here we are today. On the brink of something rather calamitous.

Globalisation has certainly created some short-term economic advantages. Now some rather long-term tight spots are emerging daily. Not least will be deciding whether to cut the poor and starving masses adrift, close our borders, look after our own, and hope that mass migration and food wars don't spill onto our shores. Certainly, in any civilised global society none of this is an option. Is it? When food is in short supply civility tends to wane somewhat.

In the interim Kiwis can carry on fat and happy in the knowledge that we fit squarely in the overfed billion category. We have endless roads leading to McDonalds, KFC and Burger King to jolly us along. Globalisation at its best.