IFT in a Global Food System

Before 1800, the average incomes in Europe and the United States were only slightly greater than those in China and, by today’s standards, all desperately poor. In the decades that followed, Western Europe and North America saw a dramatic increase in income while China and the rest of the world did not. Various factors have been proposed to explain what is known as the Great Divergence, including colonialism, capitalism, exchange of scientific ideas, and trade. Regardless, by the start of …