Changes in Population Growth, Consumption and Farming Begin to Return Former Farmlands to Nature 24 December 2012

Changes in population growth, consumption and farming begin to return former farmlands to nature 24 December 2012

Human Environment. "Happily, the cause is not exhaustion of arable land, as many have feared, but rather moderation of population and tastes and ingenuity of farmers."

Ausubel, with co-authors Paul Waggoner and Iddo K. Wernick, analyzed factors such as global land use and population growth over the last 50 years. Looking at the production index of all crops of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, they found that from 1961 to 2009 land farmed grew by only 12 percent while the index rose about 300 percent.

"Without lifting crop production per hectare, farmers would have needed about 3 billion more hectares, about the sum of the United States, Canada and China, or almost twice South America," says Back to nature. An analysis of global land use and Ausubel. "The expanded cropland would have population growth has led Rockefeller scientists to come at the expense of other covers, especially conclude that use of land for farming has reached a peak, with former farmlands returning to nature. Above, forest and grassland." land that was farmed and grazed in Chile is now returning to forest. Credit: Jesse H. Ausubel Using China as an example, Ausubel and his colleagues show that in 2010 China's maize farmers spared 120 million hectares from the land that would have been required with the yields of (Phys.org)—With the global population racing past 1961, twice the area of France. Overall, the seven billion, demographers and world leaders researchers found producing an equivalent have been concerned with depletion of resources aggregate of crop production in 2009 required only to support everyone. The future, though, may be about 35 percent of the land needed in 1961. less bleak than some have feared. Changes in population growth and how farmers use land have In addition to improved yields achieved by farmers, brought the world to "peak farmland," a team of the researchers credit additional factors leading to Rockefeller University scientists report in a special peak farmland: parents giving birth to fewer issue of the journal Population and Development children, and consumers raising their calorie Review. consumption more slowly than their affluence and moderating their meat eating. "We are excited to report that we believe that humanity has reached peak farmland, and that a "Our analyses over the past 20 years witness food large net global restoration of land to nature is decoupling from land," says Ausubel. "For millennia ready to begin," says senior author Jesse H. food production tended to grow in tandem with land Ausubel, director of Rockefeller's Program for the used for crops, a fundamental relationship in

1 / 2

population and development. Now land for food is flat. If yields had remained at prior levels, immense, continental areas of forest and range and desert would have been shaved and ploughed for human food during the past 50 years. Surprisingly, instead, we find humanity gradually moving toward what we call, with deliberate hyperbole, landless agriculture. We believe humanity now stands at peak farmland, and the 21st century will see release of wide areas of land, hundreds of millions of hectares—more than twice the area of France—for nature."

Provided by Rockefeller University APA citation: Changes in population growth, consumption and farming begin to return former farmlands to nature (2012, December 24) retrieved 28 September 2021 from https://phys.org/news/2012-12-population-growth-consumption-farming-farmlands.html

This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

2 / 2