Key messages

• The environment’s proper functioning is essential for a better life on Earth, including maintaining, enhancing, and restoring biodiversity and ecosystem services. On the one hand, the environment is driven by external factors and shocks as well as interventions within the global food system. On the other hand, simultaneously, it drives the overall health and stability of the planet (Adger, 2000; Rockström et al., 2017; Richardson et al., 2023). However, this relationship involves complex interactions and tipping points (Holling, 1973; Chapin et al., 2008; Rockstrom et al., 2009). Foresight research needs to capture this complexity in analyzing alternative future pathways for food system transformation.
• Holistic approaches, strategies, and policies are essential to address environmental stresses, promoting conservation, regeneration, and coexistence with nature. A sustainable and resilient environment requires practices respecting ecological boundaries, reducing resource consumption, fostering biodiversity, and enhancing ecosystem recovery and adaptability. Foresight research is needed to help decision-makers understand synergies and trade-offs between long-term public goods benefits and short-term private costs from resource use and management.