Optimising crops and livestock, through means of genetic editing, biofortification, improving metabolic processes to enhance energy capture, or building resistance to pathogens or challenging environmental conditions can improve food production. However, the potential of many of these techniques has remained largely untapped. Here, we will discuss what advances in science and technology would help to unlock new avenues for crop and livestock engineering, and what impact these may have on future food production

The interactions between entities across the entire ecosystem are essential for ensuring enhanced productivity and resilience of crops, as well as for reducing environmental impact. Approaches to managing ecosystemwide interactions include genetic engineering, RNA sprays, gene drives and an increasing understanding of the soil microbiome. Here, we will discuss what future technologies or knowledge could lead to a transformative approach to engineering the farming ecosystem.

What constitutes an optimal diet is still relatively unknown, and moreover, a single optimal diet will not be universal. Here we will discuss how future discoveries in microbiome research, combined with a greater understanding of how diet is linked to human and animal physiology, will improve our future understanding of nutrition, and how this will relate to human health and healthcare in the future.