Agriculture's Challenge to Develop a Vision for the Future

Abstract

Our challenge is to develop a collective “vision” of environmentally sound agricultural systems for the future to enable us to produce food at twice our current level to meet the demands of a projected eight billion people in the year 2020. We must prove that our efforts are compatible with environmental concerns and our natural resources. Public concerns and regulatory pressures on pesticides are likely to increase throughout this decade and next. Can we produce a safe, abundant, and affordable food supply on limited land for more people, while maintaining an acceptable balance with nature? Sound, science-based public polices are essential. Industry and regulators must work together more closely, striving to understand each other better, as well as the needs of our customers and those of society. The research community, using guidance from our regulators, has provided environmentally compatible crop protection chemicals, like sufonylurea herbicides, products which are often applied at a factor of 50 to 500x lower than the conventional herbicides they replace. We will continue to discover new “ideal” pest control solutions, incorporating the best technology available. This “vision” of agricultural production for the future must be accepted and embraced not only by our industry and our regulators, but also by environmentalists, other interests and society as a whole. We must reach common ground to maintain a productive, economically viable, socially acceptable, and environmentally sound agricultural system to meet our future challenges.