Green Revolution
By Dhruv Khullar, First Year Student at Yale School of Medicine
More than 850 million people around the world are undernourished. Current agricultural practices may or may not be inflicting unknown and irreparable harm on our planet. We have the power to fundamentally change the way entire continents provide food for their people. But despite their seemingly unparalleled magnitude, these issues slip in and out of “fashion” like mini-skirts and skinny jeans. The mainstream media focuses on undernutrition and environmental degradation only following select, particularly salient events, and funding for agriculture and infrastructure projects in developing countries follows a similar pattern of fluctuation. But regardless of the current level of interest and aid from the West, parts of the developing world are struggling to feed themselves on a daily basis. We would do well to keep in mind the urgency of their situation as we move forward in addressing poverty and hunger in the 21st century.
The Green Revolution has no doubt improved our ability to produce enough food to feed the world’s ever-growing population. Genetically-modified crops, better irrigation, and more fertilizers and pesticides have all contributed to farmers’ ability to increase crop yields and profits. But many critics take issue with the Green Revolution, citing its detrimental environmental impact, as well as negative health consequences and unequally distributed social benefits. The case of Punjab, India’s most productive agricultural region, is particularly telling. A growing faction of organic farmers is shunning Green Revolution techniques due to “the rising costs of seed, fertilizer, and pesticides, and concerns that decades of chemical use is ruining the soil.”[1] There is also concern that the chemical pollution from new farming techniques is causing cancer and other illnesses in the rural Punjabi population. Environmental activist Umendra Dutt argues that the “input intensive, techno-centric, resource-guzzling” Green Revolution is unsustainable and has “devastated the entire ecosystem of our society.”
While there is certainly some force behind these criticisms, we must examine the extent to which the negative consequences of the Green Revolution in Punjab and elsewhere stem from inadequate education and inappropriate implementation. In other words, how much damage is inherent to any Green Revolution, and how much might be avoided if the necessary steps are taken? And how much worse a position might we be in without the advent of these new technologies? Answering these questions will have important implications for future Green Revolutions in places like Sub-Saharan Africa.
It seems clear that a training program to educate farmers in Punjab of appropriate chemical usage and disposal techniques would go a long way in helping address the region’s contamination and pollution problems. As noted by Daniel Pepper, most rural farmers currently do not use protective equipment, reuse pesticide containers in the kitchen, and assume that the more pesticides and herbicides used, the better.[1] A relatively low cost government program educating farmers of proper protocols could substantially alleviate the undesired environmental and public health burdens currently imposed by chemical farming in Punjab.
While many critics will still decry the Green Revolution for its purported impact on the environment, it is important to consider just how great our inability to feed the world’s burgeoning population would be without these technological advances. As W. Paul Davies of the Royal Agricultural College points out, “[a]t 1961 yield levels, experts estimate that triple the land in China and double the land in India would have been needed to equal grain production levels in 1992 in these countries.”[1] Thus, by preventing the destruction of forests and cultivation of other sensitive lands, the Green Revolution may actually be a very environmentally friendly option. While we must constantly monitor the environmental impact of new farming techniques, denying poverty-stricken populations around the globe access to food is unacceptable. Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug – deemed the father of the Green Revolution – argues that most environmental lobbyists have “never experienced the physical sensation of hunger. They do their lobbying from comfortable office suites in Washington or Brussels. If they lived just one month amid the misery of the developing world, as I have for fifty years, they’d be crying out for tractors and fertilizer and irrigation canals and be outraged that fashionable elitists back home were trying to deny them these things.”[2]
Unlike India, the rest of South Asia, and much of Latin America, Africa has not enjoyed a massive increase in crop yields from the Green Revolution. Although Borlaug estimates Africa could “easily double or triple the yields of most of its crops” and become a “dynamic agricultural exporter within a few decades,” present-day Africa struggles to feed its population.[1] But the fact that Africa has yet to undergo a Green Revolution is not entirely regrettable. As Africa looks to implement the technological advances of the Green Revolution, it has the advantage of learning lessons from previous Green Revolutions to determine how best to minimize ecological damage and maximize equal distribution of benefits. Africa’s Green Revolution, then, must be tailored to its particular environment and infrastructure, but it also ought to anticipate the challenges confronted by countries around the world. Farmers should be educated on how to properly and safely use all chemicals and equipment. Furthermore, in order to prevent inequitable distribution of resources and assets, African governments should focus on implementing policies that allow smaller farms and landless laborers to afford the technologies and products available to larger farms. As the Gates Foundation and other organizations focus increasingly on agriculture in Africa, they should take care to incorporate those aspects of other Green Revolutions that were most successful, while taking steps to avoid those less desirable.
Works Cited
[1] Borlaug NE. (2003). The Next Green Revolution. New York Times, July 11.
[1] Davies WP. (2003). An historical perspective from the Green Revolution to the gene revolution. Nutrition Reviews, 61, S124-134.
[2] Tierney, John. (2008). Greens and Hunger. New York Times, May 19.
[1] Pepper D. (2008).The toxic consequences of the Green Revolution. US News & World Report, July 7.
[1] Pepper D. (2008).The toxic consequences of the Green Revolution. US News & World Report, July 7.
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