The Syngenta Photography Award 2015 Scarcity-Waste

The Syngenta Photography Award is a celebration of artistic skill and outstanding photography which aims to draw attention to, and stimulate dialogue around, key global challenges. This year’s award invited professional and amateur photographers from all over the world to submit applications responding to the theme of ‘Scarcity-Waste’.

In the past 50 years, our demands on the natural world have doubled. Many of us are barely aware of the fragility of the resources we depend upon for our survival. While resource scarcity is evident everywhere, it sits alongside enormous waste. As nearly one billion people go to bed hungry worldwide, others are wasting over half of the food they buy. The award called for photographs that tell stories about scarcity and waste and the tensions and relationships between them. Photographers, whatever their approach, were invited to interpret this theme to spark dialogue about our changing planet.

The six finalists (Mustafah Abdulaziz, Richard Allenby-Pratt, Rasel Chowdhury, Stefano De Luigi, Camille Michel and Benedikt Partenheimer) were chosen by a distinguished international jury, chaired by photography curator and writer William A. Ewing and selected from a shortlist of more than 2,000 entries.

Alongside the finalists, the exhibition also presents some of the most thought-provoking and powerful responses to the subject, ranging from the impact of population growth and climate change to the increasing demand on natural resources and food waste.

The 42 photographers from 21 countries represented in the exhibition not only illustrate the ’Scarcity-Waste’ theme in striking and ambitious ways, but also take on the role of courageous advocates, showing deep concern for our planet. Taken together, their 90 images provide a unique voice to one of the greatest challenges the world faces: how in a world that is so desperately short of resources can we ensure that there is enough land, food and water for everyone and for future generations?