Cambridge IGCSE Global Perspectives (0457): Topic: Water, food and agriculture — Study Guide

This guide covers the topic “Water, food and agriculture” from the Cambridge IGCSE Global Perspectives (0457) syllabus for examination in 2025, 2026 and 2027, Version 2 (published April 2025). The topic is on the single topic list in section 3 (“Approaches to teaching and learning”), and the syllabus says that list is for all components: Component 1 Written Exam, Component 2 Individual Report and Component 3 Team Project. The skills you practise here come from section 2 (aims and assessment objectives) and section 4 (details of the assessment).

Topic knowledge is not assessed. The syllabus says: “Knowledge of content is not assessed in this syllabus.” The topics are a context for building skills. So this page does not ask you to learn facts about farming or rainfall. It shows how to use this topic to practise the assessed skills: research, analysis, evaluation, reflection, communication and collaboration.

Use this guide with the revision notes for this topic and the practice questions for this topic. The Global Perspectives hub lists every resource, and the 0457 checklist lets you tick off each skill.

What the syllabus asks you to do

Syllabus reference	What you must be able to do (from the document)	Where assessed
Section 3, Topic list	Use a topic from the list (here, “Water, food and agriculture”) to explore global issues and different perspectives	All three components
Section 2, AO1 Research, analysis and evaluation	Research global issues, their causes and consequences and possible course(s) of action; analyse and evaluate evidence, reasoning and sources; develop a line of reasoning	Components 1, 2 and 3
Section 2, AO2 Reflection	Consider different perspectives objectively and with empathy; justify your personal perspective using evidence and reasoning	Components 2 and 3
Section 2, AO3 Communication and collaboration	Select and present arguments, evidence and perspectives clearly; include citations and references; contribute to the Team Project	Components 2 and 3
Section 4, Component 1	Understand bias, claim, fact, generalisation, opinion, prediction, value and vested interest; analyse and evaluate use of evidence and language	Component 1 Written Exam
Section 4, Component 2	Research a global issue that divides opinion, with local and/or national and global perspectives; consider several courses of action and propose one	Component 2 Individual Report
Section 4, Component 3	Identify a local issue, plan and carry out an action, and measure its success	Component 3 Team Project

Component 1 is 100% AO1, so the Written Exam tests research, analysis and evaluation only. The syllabus prints six command words: analyse, describe, evaluate, explain, identify and suggest.

Issues at global, national and local level

The syllabus defines an issue as “an important subject or problem for discussion”. Your first skill is to narrow this broad topic into issues you can argue about at each level.

• Global: whether everyone has safe water and enough food. The UN General Assembly recognised the human right to water and sanitation in 2010. In 2015, UN member states adopted the Sustainable Development Goals, including Goal 2 (zero hunger) and Goal 6 (clean water and sanitation).
• National: whether a country should grow most of its own food or buy it through trade; how to share scarce water between farms, factories and homes.
• Local: a well that dries up in summer, food prices jumping after a poor harvest, or a canteen that throws away food daily.

Key terms

• Food security: the definition agreed at the 1996 World Food Summit says it exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food for an active and healthy life.
• Water scarcity: not enough water to meet demand. Physical scarcity means the water is not there. Economic scarcity means it is there but people cannot afford or reach it.
• Subsistence farming: growing food mainly for your own family. Commercial farming: growing crops or animals to sell.
• Virtual water: the water used to produce a product, such as the water used to grow imported wheat. The geographer Tony Allan developed the idea.

Worked example (Individual Report-style paragraph)

Food prices are a global issue because many staple crops are traded across borders, so a poor harvest in one region can raise prices in many others [knowledge]. In the fictional market town of Lessford, a class survey found that 45 of 60 stall-holders said vegetable prices had risen after a dry season [application]. This links a weather event to a local consequence: families who spend a large share of their income on food must cut back first [analysis]. However, stall-holders describe what they charge, not what families can afford, so a household survey is needed to show the effect on diets [evaluation].

Perspectives on the issues

The syllabus defines a perspective as “a viewpoint on an issue based on evidence and reasoning”. In this topic, perspectives differ because people depend on water and land in different ways.

• Smallholder farmers often stress the risk of losing their land, water or a fair price. A bad year can wipe out their savings.
• Large commercial farms and food companies often stress efficiency, investment and feeding growing cities at low cost.
• City consumers usually want cheap, reliable food.
• Governments balance these groups. In July 2023, India banned exports of non-basmati white rice to keep domestic prices down. That protected Indian consumers but raised prices for rice-importing countries.
• Environmental groups point to the costs of intensive farming, such as falling groundwater, loss of forests to farmland and pollution from fertiliser.
• Peasant and small-farmer movements such as La Via Campesina argue for “food sovereignty”: the right of communities to decide how their own food is produced, rather than leaving it to world markets.

Evaluation of perspectives: ask what evidence each side gives, whether its reasoning holds, and whether it has a vested interest (something to gain or lose). A vested interest does not make data wrong. Judge the evidence and reasoning, not just the speaker.

Worked example (perspective paragraph)

A rice exporter and a family in a rice-importing city both want stable prices, but see an export ban differently [knowledge]. For the exporting government, the ban keeps rice affordable at home [application]. For the importing family, it removes supply and raises the price of a daily staple [application]. The disagreement comes from who carries the cost, not from a dispute about the facts [analysis]. The national perspective is reasonable in a crisis, but it shifts hardship abroad, so a fair judgement needs evidence from both sides [evaluation].

Causes and consequences

The syllabus asks you to analyse causes and consequences in depth. Analysis means showing links, not listing points. Build chains across levels.

• Cause chain (water): more people and more irrigated farms → more water pumped from wells and rivers → groundwater falls faster than rain refills it → shallow wells dry first. Agriculture uses about 70% of the fresh water that people withdraw worldwide, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), so farming choices drive this chain.
• Consequence chain (food): war or drought cuts a harvest → less grain is exported → world prices rise → poorer families in importing countries eat less or less well.

A real chain across levels. Ukraine is a major exporter of grain. After Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukraine’s Black Sea ports were blocked. In July 2022, the UN and Turkey brokered the Black Sea Grain Initiative to let grain ships sail. Russia withdrew from it in July 2023. A conflict in one region affected import costs for other governments and prices in distant local markets.

Cape Town, 2018. After a multi-year drought, Cape Town in South Africa warned of “Day Zero”, when most taps could be turned off. From February 2018 residents were asked to use no more than 50 litres per person per day. Water use fell, rain returned and Day Zero was avoided. It shows one cause (low rainfall plus rising demand) reaching households, a city and a nation.

Worked example (cause-and-consequence paragraph)

One cause of falling groundwater in many farming regions is that pumping costs farmers little or nothing [knowledge]. If power for pumps is free, a farmer has no money reason to save water, so thirsty crops such as rice can spread into dry areas [application]. Richer farmers then drill deeper wells while poorer neighbours’ shallow wells dry, so the issue becomes one of inequality as well as supply [analysis]. How serious this is depends on local conditions, so you need measured well levels, not a general claim [evaluation].

Judging sources and evidence

Component 1 lists eight terms you will benefit from understanding. Apply each to water and food statements.

Term	Meaning	Example statement (fictional)
Fact	Can be checked and shown true or false	“The reservoir held 40% of its capacity on 1 June.”
Opinion	A personal view that cannot be proved	“Organic food tastes better.”
Claim	A statement put forward as true that needs support	“Drip irrigation halves water use.”
Prediction	A statement about the future	“The lake will be dry by 2035.”
Value	A belief about what matters or is right	“No one should profit from water.”
Generalisation	A broad statement from limited cases	“Farmers always waste water.”
Bias	A one-sided view that leaves out other evidence	A seed advert listing only good harvests
Vested interest	Something to gain or lose from the outcome	A bottled-water firm writing about tap water

Reliability checklist: who produced it and their expertise; when (harvests and prices change yearly); how the data were collected (sample size, who measured); any vested interest; whether independent sources agree.

A strong source still has limits. The UN Environment Programme’s Food Waste Index Report 2024 estimated that about a fifth of food available to consumers was wasted in 2022, with households wasting the largest share. It is strong because a UN body gathered data from many countries. But countries measure food waste in different ways, or not at all, so some figures are estimates. Quote it as an estimate.

Worked example (evaluating a source)

A leaflet from a fictional fertiliser company claims that farmers who use its product “always get bumper harvests” [knowledge]. The company profits from sales, so it has a vested interest in reporting only good results [application]. “Always” is a generalisation, and the leaflet gives no figures, no number of farms and no comparison with farms that did not use the product [analysis]. The claim is therefore weakly supported. It would be more convincing if an independent body had compared similar farms with and without the fertiliser over several seasons [evaluation].

Courses of action

You must assess courses of action and explain your judgement. Use clear criteria:

• Effectiveness: will it reduce the problem, and by how much?
• Feasibility: cost, time and who must agree.
• Fairness: who gains and who loses? Smallholders and large farms are affected differently.
• Sustainability: will it last, and does it create a new problem, such as using more energy or more water?

Actions work at different levels. Global: Sustainable Development Goal target 12.3 aims to halve food waste per person at retail and consumer level by 2030. National: in 2016, France passed a law that stops large supermarkets from destroying unsold food that is still fit to eat and requires them to offer it to food charities. Supporters see it as a model. A limitation is that it depends on charities having the storage, transport and volunteers to collect the food. Other national actions include water pricing, help with efficient irrigation and grain reserves. Local: canteen waste schemes, community water storage and school gardens.

Worked example (judging an action)

A rule that restaurants must donate unsold food to charities could cut food waste in the fictional city of Ostley [knowledge]. However, the food is often ready late at night, and Ostley’s food bank opens only three days a week [application]. Unless collection times change, much of the food may still be thrown away, so the rule would look good on paper but achieve little [analysis]. A rule combined with funding for refrigerated storage at the food bank would cost more, but it is more likely to work, because it removes the main barrier [evaluation].

Using this topic in the Individual Report

The syllabus says the issue “should be one that divides opinion” and that you devise a global research question as your title. You need local and/or national and global perspectives, causes and consequences, several courses of action, and one chosen course of action described in detail, with how it could be implemented and what its impact would be.

Question ideas that build in disagreement:

• “Should supermarkets be required by law to give away unsold food?”
• “Should farmers pay for the water they use in the same way as households?”
• “Should countries be allowed to ban food exports when prices rise at home?”

Plan perspectives early. For the export question: local traders, a national government protecting its consumers, and importing countries. See the Individual Report study guide for structure and referencing.

Using this topic in the Team Project

The Team Project starts from a local issue. Food and water work well because results can be counted: plate waste in the canteen, or dripping taps and leaking cisterns on site.

Possible actions: a “clean plate” campaign with a weekly weigh-in, or a water audit reported to the school leadership with repair requests. The syllabus asks the team to state how they will evidence the action and measure its success. Measure before and after, the same way on matched days. Each member researches a different aspect, such as a different perspective (catering staff, students, a food charity). See the Team Project study guide.

Common errors

• Writing what you know about farming or droughts instead of analysing the sources in front of you. Component 1 does not assess prior knowledge.
• Treating a percentage as a fact without asking how it was measured. “70% of water goes to farming” is a measure of withdrawals, not of all water used.
• Assuming a farmer, a food company or a campaign group must be wrong because it has a vested interest.
• Listing causes such as “drought, war, waste” without linking them into chains that reach a consequence.
• Choosing a title such as “Food waste”, which is a topic, not a question that divides opinion.

Where to go next

• Exam skills: Written Exam study guide, Written Exam revision notes and Written Exam practice
• Coursework: Individual Report practice and Team Project revision notes
• Related topics: Climate change, energy and resources and Poverty and inequality
• This topic: revision notes and practice questions

Official syllabus

Cambridge IGCSE Global Perspectives (0457) syllabus for examination in 2025, 2026 and 2027, Version 2 (published April 2025). Topic list in section 3; aims and assessment objectives in section 2; component details and command words in section 4.