05 Dec 2012

Global Crop Intensification Lessens Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Cliff Snyder, Tom Bruulsema, Valter Casarin, Fang Chen, Raúl Jaramillo, Tom Jensen, Robert Mikkelsen, Rob Norton, T. Satyanarayana, and Shihua Tu


The global population increased from 3.08 billion in 1961 to over 6.51 billion in 2005 (111% increase), and is expected to reach almost 9 billion by 2050. This growth of the human family will result in a 70% rise in food demand. Can such food production increases be met, and if so, what will the impacts be on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and climate change? A recently published scientific journal article (Burney et al., 2010) has provided some answers to these questions.

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