IEEE Spectrum June, 2013 - 32

The age of plenty

A famous example of this involves the efforts of Soviet premier
Nikita Khrushchev to improve corn. He had long noted the
high yields of that crop in the United States. Upon becom-
ing premier he ordered that it be planted in the Soviet Union,
including in some farms in Siberia. So spectacular were the
resulting crop failures that they were held against him some
years later during his ouster, when his successors ridiculed his
"hare-brained schemes."
Crops need to be bred for specific climates, day lengths, and soil
types, and to be resistant to local pests and diseases. Much of this
work can't be done for you; you just have to do it yourself. That's
why it's so heartening that many developing-world countries are
getting serious about doing their own agricultural research. Brazil's
recent success in expanding soybean production came only after
a decade of research to adapt soybeans-normally grown in the
temperate zone-to tropical conditions. Large parts of sub-Saharan
Africa are off-limits to cattle because the tsetse fly transmits sleeping
sickness to them, but crossbreeding work is under way to improve
a local cattle breed, the N'Dama, that is resistant to the disease.
And it's not just organisms that need to be redesigned. It's big
and complex systems and networks consisting of myriad machines,
techniques, routines, chemicals, infrastructures, and more. When
Deere & Co. introduced its tractors to India, it had to redesign
the transmissions so that the machines could perform the double
duty required there-plowing and road transport. Because of the
importance of localizing innovation, the single most important
difference between countries that have sustained long-term pro-
ductivity growth and those that have not may well be in whether
they have invested in their own research systems.
A second thing that distinguishes agriculture technology from
other industries is the need to stay one step ahead of nature. Crop
pests and animal diseases are quick to evolve resistance to any
new measure we introduce to control them. And now it's not only
pests that are changing but the climate itself. Climate change poses
a real risk to agriculture, especially after 2050 if global emissions
of greenhouse gases are not curbed. Research is critical to enable
farmers to adapt to these changes, not only to improve but merely
to maintain agricultural productivity. It's similar to the Red Queen's
predicament in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, who had
to run as fast as she could just to stay in the same place.
Of course, research won't do any good if the results never leave
the lab. Success in raising productivity also requires an economic
environment that rewards farmers and agribusinesses that innovate.
When China and Vietnam abandoned their misguided experiments
with communal farms and reverted to family-run operations, their
productivity took off. When the government of Ghana imposed
heavy taxes on cocoa, its main export, many farmers abandoned
the crop and productivity languished. When taxes were reduced,
farmers rehabilitated old plantations and adopted improved seed
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stock, and output quickly recovered. Of course, political and social
factors can harm as well as help. War, brigandage, and disease-
such as HIV in Africa and avian flu in Asia-have seriously depressed
agricultural productivity growth in some countries.
Such episodes are also reflected in the history of the western
countries. Back in George Washington's time, one of the surest
ways for U.S. farmers to make money was to distill some of their
grain into whiskey, which alone was compact enough to carry
to distant markets, given the poor state of transport at the time.
Indeed, it was to overcome just such problems that the federal
government later justified investments in canals and railroads.
Even today, transportation remains a challenge in some agricul-
tural regions. Years ago, the Brazilian government used research
and infrastructure investment to improve agricultural produc-
tivity in and access to the Cerrado, a vast tropical savanna deep
inside the country. And the Cerrado has now become the "soy-
bean belt" of South America.

i'm not worrieD about the worlD's sheer capacity to grow enough
food of sufficient quality to feed us and our descendants for many
years to come. Regions that have lagged behind the agricultural
technology frontier, like much of sub-Saharan Africa, could fol-
low the examples of Brazil and China, for instance, which tapped
international expertise, invested heavily in local research, made
critical reforms to policies and institutions, and thereby raised
their farmers' productivity immensely.
Agricultural innovation is among the best ways-better perhaps
even than medical innovation-to help the broad mass of people in
the poorest countries of the world to live more comfortable lives.
No improvement in manufacturing, services, communications,
or transportation can enrich the entire bottom half of the world's
population as high-yield agriculture has done, time and again.
In later editions of his essay, Malthus himself expressed some
optimism that catastrophe could be avoided, emphasizing the
possibility that population growth could be reduced if people
delayed marriage and had fewer children. He also acknowledged
the possibility of raising productivity but insisted that this avenue
faced natural limits. But the evidence so far seems to suggest that
it is not science that is the limiting factor but rather the willing-
ness of society to understand and support the scientific endeavor.
About that, I'm slightly less optimistic. ■
Keith Fuglie is branch chief for resources, environmental, and
science policy at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic
Research Service. The views expressed here are his own and do
not reflect those of the USDA or the ERS.
post yoUr comments online at http://spectrum.ieee.org/pessimists0613
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Spectrum June, 2013
