Diet change would ease food pressure - Daily Examiner
A move away from a Western diet would help the world to feed its growing population.
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IT MAY be a struggle to feed the world's forecast nine billion people in 2050 unless the world changes its "Western" diet, says fertiliser and agribusiness giant Agrium.
Agrium Asia Pacific managing director Philip Gentry said the world was already struggling to feed just over six billion people as the area of agricultural land diminished; water became scarcer; extreme weather destroyed crops; and more grain was devoted to the production of fuel.
"The jury is still out on how easy it's going to be to feed everyone (in 2050)," Mr Gentry told reporters on Friday after addressing an American Chamber of Commerce in Australia luncheon.
"Diet change in particular would dramatically change the dynamics.
"If we're not all eating chops and hamburgers, it makes a huge difference."
Mr Gentry said in his address that the population over the next 40 years was set to rise substantially in southern Asia, especially India and Pakistan; south-east Asia, particularly the Philippines and Indonesia; and in western Asia and Africa.
The population in eastern Asia, mainly China and Japan, was set to fall.
Mr Gentry said the key enabler for agriculture was water, and there was increasing scarcity in the areas experiencing substantial population growth.
"There's real problems emerging over the decades ahead, producing in the regions where population growth is growing the fastest," Mr Gentry said.
Development and rising wealth in southeast Asia and the Pacific was also increasing the demand for meat and, subsequently, grain.
The production of one kilogram (kg) of beef required 10kgs of grain, one kilogram of pork required 5kgs of grain, and one kilogram of chicken needed 2kgs of grain.
"This is upping the ante dramatically in terms of the challenge facing agribusiness in the world," Mr Gentry said.
"We're already struggling to feed ourselves globally."
Mr Gentry said 60 per cent of the largest grain produced worldwide, corn, was used for stockfeed.
In the United States, 40 per cent of all corn produced was used to produce ethanol.
Mr Gentry said that in Australia, the area of productive agricultural land was decreasing, and putting scarce land and water to its best use was challenging.
Australia also had to deal with a high cost structure, expensive labour, the high value of the Australian dollar and the long distance from some markets.
Mr Gentry said the agriculture sector could be boosted by greater research and development, improvement of old agricultural infrastructure and the abolition of restrictive regulations such as those governing immigrants brought here to work in the agriculture sector.
The agriculture sector also needed to attract younger and better-educated farmers, given that more than 60 per cent of Australian farmers were now older than 55 years.
09 Oct, 2011--
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