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OPEN AGRICULTURE RESEARCH INSTITUTES IN THE L.D.C.s A half-century ago, farmers in industrial and underdeveloped nations alike were achieving grain yields of about 900 Ibs. per acre; today the L.D.C.s' yield averages 1,100 Ibs., v. 1,700 Ibs. in the developed nations. "There's no reason—from the standpoint of biology, climate and soils—why yields in the L.D.C.s should not be as high as or higher than those in industrialized countries," says Johnson. The gap can be narrowed by laboratories located in the L.D.C.s that would modify new plant varieties if they are found susceptible to local disease or insects. The labs could also determine which grains grow best in tropical topsoil and develop a soybean that thrives in nontemperate climate zones. Existing research institutes in underdeveloped lands lack money, staff and equipment.
Still other programs could boost food output—but in limited ways. Farmers in the tropics could be taught to plant more than one crop each year (rice in the rainy season, wheat when it is dry). Man could increasingly harvest the ocean for sources of protein. Breeding farms in coastal waters may be especially promising, but will fall far short of filling the world's growing food needs. "People once thought that the resources of the sea were infinite," observes David Wallace of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "We now know that these estimates were erroneous."
The promise held out by most of these measures encourages occasional bursts of optimism. The National Academy of Sciences declared in 1971: "The natural resources available to present technology are sufficient for a vast improvement in the standard of living of all people who will inhabit the earth 20 or 30 years from now."
It is scientifically and technologically possible to feed a world population several times its present size. Yet this projection ignores two serious limitations: the huge cost and the problem of convincing citizens of wealthy nations that they must sacrifice to help those in poor countries.
To irrigate 57 millon extra acres of farm land (a 25% increase over the present irrigated acreage) would cost $3.5 billion annually for the next eleven years. To provide an FAO-requested agricultural development fund for the L.D.C.s would run another $5 billion annually. To expand fertilizer production to meet estimated demand would cost $8 billion each year until 1980 and $12 billion yearly after that. Most staggering is the price of bringing new land under cultivation. An approximate 10% increase in the world's arable land—adding 400 million acres—would cost at least $400 billion and might run $1 trillion or more.
Energy costs will also impede agricultural development. A study by U.S. Geophysicist John Steinhart and Biologist Carol Steinhart emphasizes that many proposed programs for underdeveloped areas would be energy extravagant. High-yield grains call for fertilizers and chemicals that require much energy to produce and sometimes to apply; even tiny irrigation pumps need diesel fuels. "Where is this energy to come from?" ask the Steinharts. "The nations with the most serious food problems are those with scant supplies of fossil fuels." Thus "we could end with solutions that are too expensive for the people who need them most."