Worldwide, farming uses around 40% of total land area, two-thirds of water withdrawals and 85% of water consumption today. This is up from around 7% of total land area back in the year 1700 when the population was less than 10% of what it is today.
Advances in technology and farming practices have helped farmers become much more productive, growing crops efficiently in areas most suitable for agricultural production.
Without these advances, far more land would need to be cultivated to produce the food we need today. For instance, it has been estimated that we could produce the same amount of total food grown fifty years ago on less than one-third the amount of land used back then. If yields had stayed the same since 1961, we’d need to cultivate more than double the amount of land to feed the population today – a shift from 12.2 billion acres to at least 26.3 billion acres. That’s 82% of our total land area on earth.
Similarly, farmers tend to use water more efficiently as their yields increase. According to the International Water Management Institute, a farmer who grows about eight times the yield of another farmer uses only about three times as much water to do so.
Innovation is not only driven by technological advances, but also through novel ways of organizing farmers and connecting them to the information they need.
The frequency of weather-related catastrophic events has increased six-fold since the 1950s
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has estimated there have been 8,835 climate-related catastrophes, between 1971 and 2014, claiming 1.94 million lives and cost the global economy $2.4 trillion.
The economic cost of natural disasters from $5 billion on average each year in the 1970s to over $40 billion in 2010.
Many smallholder farmers around the world still farm the same way their ancestors did thousands of years ago. Traditional farming approaches may continue to work for some, but new practices can help many to substantially improve yields, soil quality and natural capital as well as food and nutrition security.
For example, a smallholder farmer in Africa might still scatter her seeds across her land, rather than planting evenly and in rows. This stops the plant’s roots taking up the maximum amount of nutrients from the soil. She might use seed saved from generation to generation. While indigenous seeds are important to protect genetic diversity, improved seeds could also help her to adapt to changing climate conditions, fight crop diseases and produce higher yields. She may plant the same crop year after year, rather than rotating her crops or planting a range of crops together to grow more, maintain soil health and diversify her family’s diet. And she might store her harvest in such a way that leaves it susceptible to pests, diseases and rot.
Sometimes, innovations to address these issues are taken to farms via extension training. Farmers themselves can be organized in innovative ways so they are reached more easily and effectively with information. The type and style of the extension itself has evolved much over time. For instance, advances in satellite mapping and information and communications technologies (ICTs) are transforming more traditional agricultural extension work today. Farming is becoming more precise and productive as a result.
Farmers today are faced with a changing climate, which demands seeds that can cope with increased incidents of droughts, heatwaves, floods and elevated salinity levels. This is happening while arable land per capita is ever decreasing, which compels farmers to maximize harvests on existing land.
Collective action around common resources could help vulnerable communities
To do this, the right inputs need to be used in the right amount and at the right time, in the right location. This is called the 4Rs, and is an integrated part of best management practices for improved and more efficient fertilizer application. For example, in more developed countries, global positioning systems (GPS) are helping farmers to track their use of fertilizer and match it very precisely to various soil types on their farm. It can also help them to identify potential pest or disease outbreaks.
Without pesticides and other pest controls, an estimated 70% of the world’s crop might be lost, rather than 42% today. This would require substantially more cropland being brought into production to make up for this loss.
Market access allows farmers to buy the inputs they need such as improved seeds and fertilizers, and also to bring their crops, livestock and fish to market to earn a living.
Millions of smallholder famers live in remote areas, and are often isolated from market opportunities. Innovations in connecting these farmers to market are happening in many ways – resulting from social, technical and scientific advances. These advances help farmers find and share up-to-date market pricing information; protect and add value to their harvests; invest in their business; reduce and share risk; and access finance and training.
These innovations can be used and accelerated by actors all across the agricultural value chain to reduce transaction costs and risk while helping to give farmers equal access to the opportunities that exist through trade.
