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16/12/2010
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Martin Scholten
It’s Christmas – the season when we invest extra time and energy in opulent and sumptuous food and then sit around the table to enjoy it. In western society we automatically assume that there will be enough food to go around and a wide enough variation to suit all palates. Regrettably, this is a privilege that we do not share with fellow human beings across the world. Nor has it always been the case in our own part of the world. In the second half of the 20th century a veritable revolution – the Green Revolution – had to take place to address this imbalance. Thanks to, amongst others, the systematic breeding of plants and animals, the use of artificial fertiliser, new techniques for combating blight and disease, and mechanisation, there has been a spectacular rise in the yield from agriculture and livestock farming. Even though the world population has burgeoned from 1.6 billion to more than 6 billion, more food is available per person now than in 1900.
But we face a new challenge. How can we organise things so that by – say, Christmas 2050 - everyone in the world has access to a balanced diet? By then, the world population will have risen to nine billion, with six million living in mega-cities. Higher incomes in developing economies will push up the demand for meat, fish and dairy products. Even if we lower our consumption of animal proteins, production will have to double to meet this demand. The limits to the power of Mother Nature have been in view for decades. Natural resources such as oil and phosphate are finite. Fresh water is already a scarcity in large parts of the world. Poor management and overuse can cause the erosion of fertile soil. And climatic change might reduce a White Christmas to little more than a nostalgic memory. In short, we face the mammoth task of doubling the food production and halving the ecological footprint at the same time. Twice as much with half the impact is the challenge for knowledge centres like Wageningen UR.
We can draw inspiration from the civil engineering concept of ‘Building with Nature'. The idea behind this eco-dynamic design is to gear civil engineering projects to the power of nature. Take, for example, oysters – a popular delicacy at Christmas; but oysters also form reefs that can prevent sandbank erosion in the delta. What this implies for food production is that hatcheries should be designed according to the natural needs of the mollusc so that comfort is combined with efficiency. Or make optimal use of climatic conditions for cultivating plants instead of irrigation and greenhouses. Create organic production systems that flourish under brackish, marine of arctic conditions. Deploy ecological concepts to combat plague and disease, for healthy soil fauna will improve fertility. Develop a closed phosphate cycle and generate bio-energy from agricultural waste. Healthy agriculture is founded on a clear understanding of natural processes. It all starts with listening to nature. Just as we listen to people in farming areas. In short ‘Farming with nature’ as the spearhead for healthy, scrupulous and respectable agriculture. That’s where our honest and luscious Christmas dinner begins.
A Merry Christmas and a Happy 2011
Martin Scholten
Managing director of IMARES and the Animal Sciences Group of Wageningen UR