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Resource centre on India's rural distress
 
 

Whole world can get food if fertilizers and water used more wisely: Study -Subodh Varma
-The Times of India

India's wheat and rice production can be increased by over 60 percent, sugarcane production by 41 per cent and cotton production by 73 per cent by 2050 - without cutting down forests or increasing farmed area in any other way. Sounds like a dream? A study, published in the scientific journal Nature last week, shows that this is indeed possible.

In fact it is possible to feed the whole world by 2050, the study says, even as population will jump by 2 billion to reach 9 billion and food demand will double from the present because of better living standards.

Researchers from McGill University in Montreal, Canada, and the University of Minnesota, US, gathered data from 157 countries and found that most of them - including India - suffered from a serious 'yield gap'. That is the gap between what a best-practice farm in that area can produce and what is the prevailing average production per unit land area.

Thus, in India, the study found that in wheat, the current yield was 2.49 tonnes per hectare (tph) while it could go up to 3.98 tph if proper fertilizer and water is provided. Similarly, rice yield could increase from 2.88 tph to 4.61 tph, and sugarcane yields could be increased from 63.62 tph to 88.97 tph.

How is this increase taking place? Doesn't it mean a higher pressure on the environment, by cutting down of forests? Usually increase in agricultural production is associated with negative environmental impact, including heavy use of fertilizer most of which washes away into the water system causing huge damage.

"We have often seen these two goals as a trade-off: We could either have more food, or a cleaner environment, not both," said lead author Nathaniel Mueller, a researcher with the University of Minnesota's Institute on the Environment. "This study shows that doesn't have to be the case."

What this study did was look at the global picture. They found out how much fertilizers and water are needed in different countries or areas, and compared it to how much is actually being used. Many countries and regions - including China, the US, Western Europe and even some parts of India - were using excessive fertilizer and water while the rest of the world was using much less than needed. If the fertilizer and water use were rationalized and spread equitably, yields would go up in the deficient regions substantially, but without causing declines in the extra-using regions.

Worldwide, nitrogen use could be cut by 28 percent and phosphorus use by 38 percent without adversely affecting yields for corn, wheat and rice, the study found. With strategic redistribution of nutrient inputs, underperforming lands worldwide could be brought up to 75 percent of their production potential while only increasing global nitrogen use 9 percent and potassium use 34 percent-and reducing phosphorus use 2 percent, the study said.

The researchers caution that their analysis is at a coarse scale and that many other factors, including land characteristics, use of organic fertilizers, economics, geopolitics, water availability and climate change will influence actual gains in crop production and reductions in adverse environmental impacts, according to a University of Minnesota statement.

However, the study strongly indicates that closing the "yield gap" on underperforming lands-previously identified as one of five promising points for meeting future food needs, along with halting farmland expansion in the tropics, using agricultural inputs more strategically, shifting diets and reducing food waste-holds great promise for sustainably boosting food security, the statement said.