Agricultural Research Key to Feeding the World’s Hungry People

Yesterday, World Bank President Robert Zoellick helped celebrate the 40^th anniversary of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), congratulating the organization on its work to overcome global hunger and poverty.

The Washington, DC,  anniversary event highlighted the importance of continued research to reducing hunger. Much of the United States’ success is directly related to investment in agriculture. In 1900, 50 percent of the U.S. population was involved in agriculture. Today the figure is just 2 percent—yet U.S. farmers are able to feed our own 300 million people and export enough surplus food to feed millions more. The United States exports agricultural technology as well.

CGIAR and other research organizations helped free 23 million people in China from hunger. And today, more than 60 percent of the maize and 50 percent of the beans planted in Africa are varieties developed by CGIAR. Investments in research have also enabled CGIAR to develop drought-tolerant, pest-resistant, and nutrient-rich varieties of crops. The founder of CGIAR, Dr. Norman Borlaug, said in his 1970 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, “The Green Revolution has not yet been won.” His statement is still true today, when high food prices are threatening the food security of an additional 44 million people.

To feed a projected global population of 9 billion in 2050, agricultural production will need to increase by 70 percent from current levels. In the 1970s, as a result of pioneering work by Borlaug and others, rice and wheat yields were rising by 3 percent a year. Now these yields are increasing by just 1 percent annually. In many parts of the world, crop production is falling dramatically. Climate variability alone is predicted to reduce yields in Africa by 38 percent.

At the G-20 agriculture ministers’ meeting this June, member countries made the critical point that both food-surplus and food-deficit countries need to strongly support agricultural research. According to the International Food Policy Research Institute, it will take an increase in spending on agricultural research from the current $5 billion per year to $16 billion just to raise global yields by 1 percent by 2025.

To meet the challenge of feeding hungry people, Zoellick said we need to continue the visionary work of Dr. Borlaug and other researchers. The key is to invest in collaborative agricultural research that builds the research and technical capacity of developing countries. This sets the stage to achieve greater food security through sustainable development and economic growth.