Tag Archives: agriculture

Can the Earth feed 9 billion people?

News: Overpopulation    February 25, 2011
Less than twenty years ago if you asked almost anybody – “Is there enough food for everybody on Earth?” – answering would not even elicit a scratch of the head. Obviously, it can and does. This was the era of the green revolution, when a combination of new crop varieties, pesticides, fertilizers and agricultural management [...]
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Wild seeds for climate change

Impact: Climate Change    December 11, 2010
Perhaps dealing with climate change requires bold, even dramatic steps. Now that the Cancún climate change conference has ended with a diplomatically modest advance in various proposals (based on modest expectations) – and most of the difficult issues punted to the meeting next year in South Africa – it seems likely the best the world [...]
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Radical thinking in agriculture needed

News: Genetic Modification    February 12, 2010
A new report, published online in the journal Science, titled “Radically Rethinking Agriculture for the 21st Century” was prepared by sixteen top specialists in population, climate, agriculture, and food genetics. They represented a mixture of academics, corporations (Monsanto, DuPont), and government scientists. The report was first presented to the U.S. State Department in 2009. Three [...]
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Prevent oxidation with nanoparticles derived from corn

News: Nanotechnology    December 10, 2009
News about nanotechnology is reported almost every day. Nanotechnology in agriculture, not so much. Nanotechnology made from agricultural products, we hear about that even less. So this story concerning research done at Purdue University (Indiana, USA), which uses nanoparticles manufactured from corn to extend the shelf life of certain oils demonstrates the radiation of nanotech [...]
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GM (Gene Modified) squash crops win some, lose some

News: Genetic Modification    November 1, 2009
It can be the biological equivalent of “whack-a-mole.” Use gene modification to produce crops that have resistance to one disease, and the modification creates crops more vulnerable to another disease. Here’s a specific example.
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Royal Society says GM research needed

News: Genetic Modification    October 28, 2009
When the Royal Society (of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge) issues reports, lots of people pay attention. When it takes on controversy, in this case promoting (among other things) the genetic modification (GM) of food to alleviate short supply for the coming growth in world population, then it gets all kinds of attention.
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Nanoparticles boost plant growth

News: Nanotechnology    October 28, 2009
Nanotechnology used in agriculture – nano-agriculture. Now there’s another hyphenated word to consider. Perhaps it belongs in the same thought with genetic modification (GM), perhaps not. In any case, nano-agriculture is not a slow growth field of research. “Nanotechnology is predicted to transform the entire food industry, changing the way food is produced, processed, packaged, [...]
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