Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Center for Economics and the Environment: Policy Series
Abstract
I come today with a heartfelt plea from the world’s farmers to its environmentalists: “Please understand that high yield farming is mankind’s greatest humanitarian achievement while also its greatest environmental triumph.”
High-yield farming is the major factor in lowering both human death rates and human population growth rates — while minimizing the land required to feed each person. Because of this, we fully agree that humanity now has the capability of, and thus the responsibility for, saving the wildlife still on this planet. With population growth continuing — though at a declining rate — and the rapid spread of global affluence, there is only one viable strategy for conserving the world’s wildlife over the next 50 years: We must triple the food yields per acre on the current farmlands. But be of good cheer, we have accomplished the feat before.
Publication Date
4-2007
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Avery, Dennis T., "Saving the Planet with Higher Yields from 21st Century Farms" (2007). Center for Applied Economics. 36.
https://digitalcommons.lindenwood.edu/cee/36