Transformations to Serve Societies
The fundamental role of fertilizers with their far-reaching implications for
ecosystem and human health urges us to take a hard look at our current
fertilizer products, technologies and use. The immense challenge is to
turn the negative spirals in production-ecological processes due to
human interventions into positive processes by exploiting ecological
synergies based on ecological intelligence and literacy.14 The impact
of fertilizers through the interconnectedness between the many
ecosystem drivers, with both direct and indirect impacts on human
health, wealth and overall well-being deserves undivided collective
attention and an effort placed toward innovative fertilizers. Vice versa,
innovative products and renewed approaches and guidelines for their
use will make lofty improvements to societal development.
Innovative fertilizer products should:
1. Serve as a production input to raise profitability of smallholder
farmers and alleviate poverty
2. Improve nutritional quality of food to help fight hidden hunger
3. Help to reduce farmers’ production risk through healthier,
more robust and resilient crops
4. Drive high yield levels for production of sufficient food to
ensure food security
5. Be taken up instantaneously by feeding the plant rather than
the soil
6. Be easily available and accessible to empower social groups,
including women and young farmers
The fundamental role of fertilizers with their
far-reaching implications for ecosystems and human
well-being urges us to take a hard look at our current
fertilizer products, technologies and use.
7. Be climate-smart by reduced emissions of greenhouse gases
and losses to surface and groundwater
8. Sustain and improve the ecological production base of soil,
water and biodiversity
9. Minimize resource use and advance processing of nutrientcontaining waste products toward a circular economy
Such comprehensive one-stop-shop for addressing multiple
interconnected societal issues implies a systems change to bring
about the next mega-trend in agricultural development. Breakthrough
technologies will be an essential component in this process of systems
change, but pursuing quick fixes to such a comprehensive issue
without considering the context may be an oxymoron, more so given
the non-linear nature of ecological processes and the complexity of
societal requirements.
VFRC is, therefore, fostering the processes leading to a desired systems
change by building a global science network for developing a research
agenda to be mainstreamed in R&D