Farm Productivity Needs to Rise ‘Significantly,’ Von Witzke Says

Farm productivity will need to rise “significantly” to feed a growing world population, said Harald von Witzke, professor of agricultural trade and development at Berlin’s Humboldt University. Following are comments he made at the “Feeding the World” meeting organized by Economist Conferences in Geneva yesterday.

“Supply growth is constrained by the availability, or lack thereof, of land and water. Declining agricultural productivity growth is what we’ve seen for a long period of time. General neglect of agriculture, agricultural research, neglect of agricultural productivity growth. There is a need for significant growth in agricultural productivity if we are to feed the world in 2050. We need productivity growth in this world, we know how to do it, we just need to do it.”

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