Regenerating the Green Revolution Gordon Conway

Regenerating the Green Revolution Gordon Conway Paper prepared for presentation at the “Food for the Future: Opportunities for a Crowded Planet” conference conducted by the Crawford Fund for International Agricultural Research, Parliament House, Canberra, Australia, August 8, 2002 Copyright 2002 by Gordon Conway. All rights reserved. Readers may make verbatim copies of this document for non-commercial purposes by any means, provided that this copyright notice appears on all such copies. Regenerating the Green Revolution KEYNOTE ADDRESS GORDON CONWAY ‘To die of hunger is the bitterest of fates’ - Homer, and developing countries had become much better. The Odyssey Advances in medicine and health care had freed millions from the burden of disease, and people ‘A hungry man is an angry man’ - African saying everywhere lived longer. In the industrialized ‘The Green Revolution was one of the great countries housing, employment and improved technological success stories of the 20th century. It working conditions provided better lives and greatly increased cereal yields in developing livelihoods. In the developing countries the Green countries, brought down food prices and fed many Revolution prevented famine and helped feed millions of people. However, there were many who millions on a sustainable basis. We at the did not benefit, especially in Africa, and there Rockefeller Foundation were significantly were other undesirable consequences. Today, involved in providing funding that promoted all of some 800 million people remain chronically these achievements, and our grantees can take undernourished. There is no single silver bullet pride in what was achieved. solution. It requires a cessation of conflicts, Nevertheless, as we enter the 21st century, poverty accessible input and output markets, and fair trade and inequity remain. Of 6 billion people in the for the agricultural exports of the developing world, more than 1 billion live on less than the countries. But it also needs technologies, both equivalent of US$1 per day. Virtually all of these conventional and biotechnologies, that increase ‘poorest of the poor’ live in developing countries. yields and are sustainable and environmentally The poor in the industrialized countries, such as friendly – in short a Doubly Green Revolution.’ the USA or Australia, are relatively better off, yet It is difficult for us to take a measured and they too live in depressed urban and rural settings, balanced view of the 20th century. We are too cut off from the economic and social mainstream close, too involved ourselves in both the tragedies of their societies. and the achievements. Yet we can make some The challenge for us is simply stated. Can we do rough assessments. The wars – world wars and even better this century? To our advantage, we are local conflicts – were devastating on a scale that in the midst of great science and technology was unprecedented. Nevertheless, by the end of revolutions – in information technology and the the century people’s lives in both the industrialized cellular and molecular sciences – that are fuelling the process we know as globalization. We know DR GORDON CONWAY was elected the twelfth that these new technologies can make life better President of The Rockefeller Foundation in April for everyone, wherever they live. The issue is 1998. He was educated at the Universities of Wales (Bangor), Cambridge, Trinidad and California whether we have the will, the policies, the (Davis). His discipline is agricultural ecology. He institutions and the trained human resources to has lived and worked in many countries in Asia and ensure that this happens. the Middle East. Prior to joining The Rockefeller Foundation, he was vice-chancellor of the University of Sussex and Chair of the Institute for Development The war on hunger Studies. He has authored Unwelcome Harvest: Agriculture and Pollution (Earthscan, Island Press), The scientific and technological fight against The Doubly Green Revolution: Food for all in the hunger is not new, and much has been achieved. 21st Century (Penguin and University Press, Cornell); and Islamophobia: A Challenge for Us All Prior to the Green Revolution, 50% of the (The Runnymede Trust). population in the less developed countries did not get enough to eat; today the proportion is 20%. P AGE 8 F OOD FOR THE F UTURE: OPPORTUNITIES FOR A C ROWDED P LANET Since the 1970s the greater yields of the new remained stagnant at only about 1 ton ha-1 for the varieties developed by the International last three decades (Fig. 1). Agricultural Research Centers (the IARCs) have helped reduce food prices in real terms by over How do we reverse these trends? One answer is 70%. This has benefited the poor, who spend the political. The famines now sweeping southern highest proportion of their income on food (FAO Africa are partly a consequence of drought, but 1994). also due to inappropriate policies and mismanagement. In several regions, conflict takes Yet today about 800 million people live a life of a severe toll. Food aid – currently running at 3.23 permanent or intermittent hunger and chronic million tons yr-1 in Africa – helps prevent undernourishment (FAO 2001). They lack ‘food starvation in these extreme situations but can security’: i.e. they do not have access at all times create dependency (WFP 2001). to enough food to lead active, healthy lives (World Bank 1986). A high percentage are women and Most of the hungry in Africa, however, are not the children; more than 180 million children under 5 victims of wars or incompetent governments. years of age are severely underweight, including a Hunger is widespread in Africa. Some claim there quarter of the children under 5 in developing is enough food in the world for everyone if it were countries. Hunger and health intersect here – evenly distributed. True, but this argument ignores children who are malnourished are more reality. Africa does not produce enough food to vulnerable to infections and disease. In the feed itself even if it were more evenly distributed. developing countries, 11 million children under Rather, Africa must rely on massive purchases, five die each year, and malnourishment contributes using precious foreign exchange, and on equally to at least half of these deaths (UNICEF 2001). large shipments of food aid with the accompanying Short of actual hunger, lack of protein, vitamins, disincentives for local production, and still over minerals and other micronutrients in the diet 30% of the population remains undernourished. causes widespread debility. About 250 million children suffer from vitamin A deficiency Others argue that hunger is simply a matter of (ACC/SCN 2000), which causes eye damage – half poverty. If the poor had higher incomes, they could a million children become partially or totally blind purchase the food they need, and it would be each year. Many subsequently die. Recent research produced to satisfy their demand. Again there is has shown that lack of vitamin A also has a serious truth in this. But there are no signs of large-scale pervasive effect, apparently reducing the ability of manufacturing investments in Africa that would children’s immune systems to cope with infection dramatically increase incomes. The reality is that (Sommer and West 1996). Iron deficiency is most African families are farm families. It is only common in the developing countries, affecting a through greater agricultural production (and the billion people. Over 400 million women of development of natural resources generally) that childbearing age (15–49) have anemia caused by poor Africans can produce enough food and other iron deficiency (Rush 2000). As a result they tend to give birth to stillborn or underweight babies and 4 are more likely to die in childbirth. 3 Asia 2 Hunger in Africa Africa The situation in Sub-Saharan Africa is especially 1 dire. Food production per capita in most African Cereal yields (t/ha) countries has declined over the past decade, 0 reflecting rapid population growth (averaging 3% 1970 1980 1990 2000 yr-1) and low yields resulting from rates of depletion of soil nutrients that far exceed those of replenishment (average losses in many countries Figure 1. Cereal yield trends; developing countries of 1 exceed 60 kg NPK ha-1 yr-1) and crop losses caused Asia compared with sub-Saharan Africa, 1970–2000 by pests, diseases and abiotic stresses, such as drought (Henno and Baanante 1999). Unlike in Asia, where average crop yields have increased 1 substantially, in Africa average cereal yields have FAO Internet Database F OOD FOR THE F UTURE: OPPORTUNITIES FOR A C ROWDED P LANET P AGE 9 farm products to stimulate rural economies and so Yields achieve higher incomes. As numerous studies have The prognosis for filling the gap is not good. shown, agricultural development is a necessary Recent data on crop yields and production suggest precursor to larger economic and social a degree of stagnation that is worrying. There is development (Delgado et al. 1998). widespread evidence of declines in the rates of The question is: what kind of agricultural yield growth (Fig. 2). development? I argue that, like the Green th A combination of causes is responsible (Pingali Revolution of the 20 century that was so and Rosengrant 2001). On the best lands many successful in feeding much of Asia, it has to be farmers are producing yields close to those in based on science and technology. Yet it has to be experiment stations, and there has been little or no different in the technologies that are used, in part increase in yield ceilings of rice and maize in because science has advanced and because the recent years. Another contributing factor is the circumstances in Africa demand a different set of cumulative effect of environmental degradation, technologies. partly caused by agriculture itself. Long-term cereal production experiments in many developing A doubly green revolution countries exhibit marked downward trends in yields.

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