The exact opposite is the case.  Individuals, families, and local communities taking responsibility for the production of their own non-hybrid, heirloom variety based food supplies.  This is the key to the Food Crisis, not reliance on genetically modified food…and since so many in the UK are facing the very real possibility of a 3 day work week or unemployment there couldn’t be a better time to start spading that planning that plot.

Source: Bloomberg.com

The world is facing an “enormous” challenge to feed a growing population as temperatures warm globally and genetically-modified foods may be part of the solution, the U.K. government’s top scientist said.

With worsening food shortages, governments need to increase agricultural research spending and reconsider options including genetically-modified, or GM, foods, which have been historically rejected by consumers in Europe, John Beddington told the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

“We have at the global level a genuine issue of world food shortage,” Beddington told lawmakers. “GM is not the only answer but it may well be a part of an answer to a number of very difficult problems.”

A 60 percent rise in food prices from early 2007 until mid- 2008 caused riots in countries including Cameroon, Haiti and Egypt. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in June that as much as $20 billion a year is needed in agricultural investments to tackle the issue of supplying enough food to feed the world.

The dilemma for governments is to grow 50 percent more food in two decades and double production in four decades “on less land because of urbanization, climate change and so on; with less water, and probably using less fertilizers and less pesticides” than before, Beddington said late yesterday.

“Can you feed 9 billion people by 2050 in some form of equitable and sustainable way?” Beddington said. “It’s an enormous challenge.”

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Technorati Tags: Food Crisis, GM Food

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