Presentation delivered by Sir Gordon Conway (Imperial College London, UK) at Borlaug Summit on Wheat for Food Security. March 25 - 28, 2014, Ciudad Obregon, Mexico.
http://www.borlaug100.org
2. The Green Revolution
• Yield ceilings of staple crops increased dramatically
• Especially in well favoured, well irrigated lands
• Production grew faster than population
• The real price of staple foods decreased
3. Wheat Yields in Mexico, India and
Pakistan
FAO. 2010. FAOSTAT
5. Teething Problems
“India had produced so much grain over the next few
years that there weren’t enough people to harvest the
crop!
There weren’t even enough bullock carts to haul the
wheat to threshing floors.
There weren’t enough jute bags, trucks, rail cars or grain
storage facilities.
Some towns closed schools temporarily to house the
grain.”
6. The Limitations
• Focused on ‘ideal’ environments
• Heavy reliance on synthetic pesticides and
fertilizers
• Not all the poor benefited
• Passed Africa by
7. Pesticides in rice fields
Brown planthoppers caused
$300 million in damage up to
late 1970s
Popular-science.net
www.htysite.com
R.C. Saxena IRRI
13. About 1 billion people are chronically
hungry
In Africa 40%
of children
under 5 are
malnourished
14. We have to increase food production by
70 – 100% by 2050
Demand
Population Growth
Changing Diets
Biofuel Demand
Supply
Rising Fuel and Fertiliser
prices
Climate Change
Land and Water Scarcity
15. Population Growth to 2050
World Africa
Roughly half of the extra people will be in Sub-Saharan Africa
16. Rise in Meat Consumption
Meat consumption
rises with per capita
income
World Bank, 2010. World Development Indicators
FAO, 2009
More meat requires
more feed
17. Changing Climate: Increasing Stress
Length of Growing Period Changes to length of Growing
Period to 2050
Source: ILRI, 2006, Mapping climate vulnerability and poverty.
18. Changing Climate: Extreme Events
Russia
• Severe heat wave in 2010
• 30% of grain crops lost to
burning
Pakistan
• Worst floods in 80 years
• Submerged 14% of cultivated
land
19. Land and Water Scarcity
• Physical scarcity
• Overuse
• Degradation
• Pollution
• Salinisation
20. We must produce more with less!
• More food and other
agricultural products
• More nutritious foods
• Higher farm incomes
• Greater diversity of
production
On the same amount of
land or less
With the same amount or
less of water
23. Intensification must be Sustainable
• With efficient and prudent use of inputs
• Minimising emissions of Greenhouse Gases
• While increasing natural capital and environmental
services
• Reducing environmental impact
• Strengthening resilience
24. Precision Farming in the UK
Tractor with GPS system
Phosphorus Deficiency
http://www.willingtoncropservices.co.uk/
27. Innovation for Sustainable Intensification
• Focuses on multiple benefits
• Engages with multiple partners
• Utilises multiple approaches
• Works at multiple scales
37. Drought Tolerant Maize: Chaperone Genes
• Genes from bacterial RNA that
help to repair misfolded RNA
molecules resulting from stress
• Plants rapidly recover
• DroughtGard maize released in
2013
• African field trials in progress
• A Resilience Gene