OFC '10: Farmers must double livestock production

The rapid expansion of economies such as China where average meat consumption has more than doubled in twenty years is the biggest challenge facing farming, warned John Parker, globalisation correspondent at the economist.

Speaking at the Oxford Farming Conference yesterday (Tuesday, January 5) Mr Parker said cereal growers would also need to increase production by 40 per cent to stave off any future food crisis.

Because the growth in agricultural production had been in decline for over 20 years he concluded business as usual ‘was not an option’.

“We need a technological breakthrough of the scale we saw in the 1960s with the Green Revolution,” said Mr Parker.

“It will be very difficult to reverse the decline in the growth of yields of the last 20 years though,” he said.

Mr Parker said the demand for livestock from a growing ‘middle class’ of consumers in emerging economies would be the biggest challenge to agriculture.

“The FAO say we will need to double livestock production by 2050 – that will mean livestock will become agriculture’s biggest sector for the first time ever.

“It is a huge challenge,” he said.

He also warned the price of food would be higher over the next 40 years.

“World prices have come down from a peak but they will rise again and continue to rise into the future,” he said. 

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