Technologies to deliver food and climate security through agriculture

Horton, P. and Long, S.P. and Smith, P. and Banwart, S.A. and Beerling, D.J. (2021) Technologies to deliver food and climate security through agriculture. Nature Plants, 7 (3). pp. 250-255. ISSN 2055-0278

Abstract

Agriculture is a major contributor to environmental degradation and climate change. At the same time, a growing human population with changing dietary preferences is driving ever increasing demand for food. The need for urgent reform of agriculture is widely recognized and has resulted in a number of ambitious plans. However, there is credible evidence to suggest that these are unlikely to meet the twin objectives of keeping the increase in global temperature within the target of 2.0 °C above preindustrial levels set out in the Paris Agreement and delivering global food security. Here, we discuss a series of technological options to bring about change in agriculture for delivering food security and providing multiple routes to the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere. These technologies include the use of silicate amendment of soils to sequester atmospheric CO2, agronomy technologies to increase soil organic carbon, and high-yielding resource-efficient crops to deliver increased agricultural yield, thus freeing land that is less suited for intensive cropping for land use practices that will further increase carbon storage. Such alternatives include less intensive regenerative agriculture, afforestation and bioenergy crops coupled with carbon capture and storage technologies.