The graphs shows the acceleration of the world's population and therefore
and increasing food demand.
Although I have no data myself on the world's total food production,
but there are some graphs on ...
https://ourworldindata.org/yields-and-land-use-in-agriculture
...
which clearly show a similar pattern in agricultural production.
BUT how long can this be sustained?, and there millions
(billions?) of undernourished people suffering from starvation and
disease, primarily from lack of local food production for one reason
or another e.g. climate conditions, war, overuse of soil using
non-sustainable agricultural practice.
To minimise the effects of lack of food, everyone should have access
to safe nutritious food - sufficient as well as providing a balanced
diet - this concept is known as 'food security'.
Food security can be defined as "the
state of having reliable access to a sufficient quantity of
affordable, nutritious food".
GM crops can help, but it is only one approach to increasing food production:
As already describe above, some developments so
far include:
genetically engineered crops can be designed to be pest
resistant and survive in drought conditions,
and crops can be GM designed to combat certain nutrient
deficiencies e.g. increasing the content of a chemical in
'Golden Rice' that helps make Vitamin A in the body.
However, there are still issue of concern
where GM is of little help:
Poor quality soil lacking in
nutrients or water means crops will fail, even if they are GM.
Though extra nutrients - fertiliser
can still be added to the soil.
Hunger exists where people
cannot afford to buy food, even if it is available,
therefore you need political and economic strategies to tackle
poverty and improve/make fairer the economy and maybe import
food too.
There is a danger that the agricultural
production of a country might be too dominated by multinational
companies that manufacture the GM seeds.
GM crops are not the complete answer and neither
should they always the 'first choice' in the future.
There are reason for lack of food which GM cannot
do little about e.g.
Poor soil can be improved by application of
fertilisers, but not overuse, which causes environmental problems.
You can control disease and insect infestation without using
GM crops and/or herbicides and pesticides.
You can use biological methods to control pests -
deploying other organisms to reduce pest numbers which can act as
predators or parasites.
These biological methods can be more sustainable
than chemical pesticides, so less harmful to the environment.
See also more detailed
Food Security
gcse biology revision notes
Be able to understand and discuss issues concerning using GM
products in agriculture to increase the world production of food for a
rising population.
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Food and the world's population