We are urgently developing research requirements with other European laboratories to make sure we understand and the disease (Schmallenberg) better.Experts call for 70pc increase in food production
FARMERS will need to increase their productivity by 70 per cent if they are to produce enough food by 2050, experts have warned.
Speaking at the High-Level Expert Forum on How to Feed the World, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said there would need to be major improvements in yield and cropping if farmers are to meet the challenge.
FAO director general Jaques Diouf told delegates at the two-day conference agriculture had ‘no choice’ but to respond to the challenge.
He also said organic agriculture was not an answer to the problem, urging governments to invest in research and development in conventional agriculture and emerging technologies.
He said: “The combined effect of population growth, strong income growth and urbanisation… is expected to result in almost the doubling of demand for food, feed and fibre. Agriculture will have no choice but to be more productive.
“While organic agriculture contributes to hunger and poverty reduction and should be promoted, it cannot by itself feed the rapidly growing population.”
He also warned climate change would make the challenge more difficult, with the latest FAO figures predicting output will fall by up to 30 per cent in Africa and up to 21 per cent in Asia as a result of extreme weather patterns.
Mr Diouf said: “Global agriculture will have to cope with the effects of climate change, notably higher temperatures, greater rainfall variability and more frequent extreme weather events such as floods and droughts.”
He also warned the biofuels market ‘has the potential to change the fundamentals of agricultural market systems’ with production set to increase by nearly 90 per cent over the next 10 years, taking yet more food crops out of the system.
The FAO used the event to call on governments across the world to increase aid to agriculture from the $7.9 billion a year currently being invested to a total of $44 billion a year which the group estimates will be needed to meet those challenges.
The issue will come into further focus next month when heads of state from the FAO’s 192 member nations meet for a global summit on food security in Rome.