The Life Sciences Recent Progress and Application to Human Affairs The World of Biological Research Requirements for the Future (1970) / Chapter Skim
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On Feeding Man
On Feeding Man
Pages 177-187
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From page 177... ...
4. A sound scientific basis has been constructed for agricultural practice; its extension, worldwide, coupled with provision of the necessary capital, could undoubtedly assure an adequate food supply for a world population that can limit its numbers to only moderate growth in the future Modern agricultural practice is one of the greatest of scientific triumphs.
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From page 178... ...
His actual choice of crop rests on market forces price and regional eating habits-coupled with the suitability of his farm for specific forms of tillage. Thereafter, the result depends upon the genetic strain employed, application of fertilizer, soil and cultivation management, control of pests and weeds, water supply, and harvest.
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From page 179... ...
When the opportunity is taken to aid corn production in developing countries, field selection of varieties is first resorted to for expediency before undertaking the slower development of hybrids. Corn has the drawback of being deficient in the content of the nutritionally required amino acids lysine and tryptophan.
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From page 180... ...
Although, even now, 10 to 15 percent of each major crop is lost to infectious disease, virtually the whole of American agriculture consists of plantings of strains especially bred for resistance to specific pathogens. In this way, the wheat crop was saved from attack by bunt (stinking smut)
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From page 181... ...
In many of the western states particular difficulties are met by assuring adequate iron supply for many crops and taking care with interaction of iron, copper, zinc, and phosphate nutrition. If legumes such as soybeans, alfalfa, or clover are raised, the presence of suitable strains of nitrogen-fixing bacteria-the Rhizobia is necessary.
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From page 182... ...
A series of congeners have since become available to spare the farmer in this classical task, because spraying with appropriate herbicides, tailored both to the major weeds and the crop to be spared, is even more successful than mechanical procedures. Similarly, recognition of the insecticidal properties of DDT in 1939, initially used against insects directly injurious to man, indicated that intelligent application of understanding of insect physiology, entomology, pharmacology, and the arts of the organic chemist could prevent crop destruction by insects.
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From page 183... ...
Some insects have been utilized for control of weeds e.g., prickly pear in Australia and the Klamath weed in the western United States while a combination of the cinnabar moth and the ragwort seed fly is required to keep down the population of the toxic range weed, the tansy ragwort. Still more imaginative and dramatic are such special procedures as the elimination of insect species, e.g., the screwworm, by introduction of sterile males (sterilized chemically or by gamma irradiation)
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From page 184... ...
They can graze sparsely vegetated rangeland and can be brought to very high efficiency through management and use of biology. In the United States, more than two thirds of the total crop production is fed to animals.
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From page 185... ...
Attempts have been made to transplant the highly productive dairy animals of temperate zones to more tropical climates, where animal productivity is low and the need for dairy products great. These have failed; even when the cows themselves thrive, their milk production is dramatically reduced.
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From page 186... ...
Fishing is still a form of hunting economy. If fish farming were to be undertaken on an extensive scale worldwide, governments would be forced to reach clear and workable agreements governing fishing rights and territorial waters.
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From page 187... ...
The bleak image of lone farmers gathering meager crops is being supplanted in some areas by scenes of abundant harvest. Two to three years ago, for the first time since 1903, the Philippines produced more than enough rice for its own people, utilizing a new, short stiff-strawed rice carefully engineered to thrive in Philippine paddies.
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