As significant as the advances in precision farming were, they paled in comparison to the continued advances in genomics that had pushed the yield of soybeans to 200 bushels per acres and corn to 410 bushels per acre. As farmers around the world reaped similar advances, concerns over feeding the world’s surging population had begun to dissipate. (Poverty and starvation still exist but are caused mainly by ineffective and corrupt political regimes—not because of food scarcity.)
The most significant yield increases were seen in the crops of sugar cane, wheat, corn, soybeans, rice, barley, potatoes and sorghum. The advances were not only credited with feeding the additional half a billion new people on the planet, the advances in genetics were also making people around the world healthier. In the United States, certain crops were modified to add Omega-3 to peoples’ diets in an effort to reduce the prevalence of heart disease. In India and China, iron was added to certain types of rice to fight against iron-deficiency, and in northern climates of North America and Europe Vitamin D was added to wheat to counter the negative consequences of a natural lack of sunlight.
So noteworthy were the advances in genomics that by 2019 a number of leading environmental groups had reversed their long standing opposition to genetically modified organisms (GMO). “To do otherwise,” said Renee LaChappelle, executive director of World Sustainable Land Institute, “would be to relegate millions of the world’s poorest citizens to a continued existence of poverty, starvation and death.” LaChapelle went on to add, “The world simply can’t afford the luxury of only producing and consuming organically grown crops. They’re too water intensive and spoil much too quickly.” A handful of sustainable/organic-related organizations opposed the policy shift but they were now a distinct minority and no longer argued GMO crops didn’t use less water or fewer chemical inputs but, rather, were bad because they ceded too much power to the large companies that made the seeds.
Officials at the largest ag-bio companies, plus a handful of smaller private genetic start-ups, countered that their technology was necessary if they were to continue to build upon the extraordinary advances achieved in the past decade. Advances, they argued, that were equal to—and in some cases greater than—the improvements witnessed during the “Green Revolution” of the 1960’s and 1970’s.
Perhaps the greatest of these achievements was the creation of new types of perennial wheat and corn. This advance alone effectively doubled farmers yields by allowing them to harvest two crops a year whereas before only one was possible.
In a handful of African countries this breakthrough virtually eliminated the food crisis and was credited with bringing political stability for the first time in decades. As an added benefit the deep roots of the perennial crops allowed the crops to access the water deeper in the land, thus holding the soil intact and preventing erosion.
Ironically, as more land was being cultivated and with growing periods becoming more pronounced, the amounts of chemical inputs—fertilizers, pesticides, and fungicides—were decreasing. Part of the decrease was due to the creation of genetically modified crops that offered better natural protection against certain diseases, funguses and insects; part could be attributed to the exponential growth of micro-sensors farmers were deploying across their farms to better monitor when and where they needed to deploy the inputs; and part was the result of continued advances in precision farming that allowed doses to be prescribed in precisely measured amounts.
Only slightly less significant than the creation of new perennial types of crops in terms of increasing agricultural output was the creation of new types of drought-resistant seeds that could grow in conditions previously not conducive to farming. These advances were especially beneficial to farmers in the arid regions of Australia, northwest China and sub-Saharan Africa.
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photo by: Laurent Renalt
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