Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
CHAPTER 11
CROP BREEDING FOR LOW-INPUT
AGRICULTURE: A SUSTAINABLE
RESPONSE TO FEED A GROWING
WORLD POPULATION
TIFFANY L. FESS, JAMES B. KOTCON,
AND
VAGNER A. BENEDITO
11.1 INTRODUCTION
As the world population increases and the availability of resources de-
creases (Figure 1), the need for efficient food production has become para-
mount (Table 1). Modern high performance varieties are usually bred for
high-input systems. However, as resources decline and populations grow,
high-input systems become less sustainable and realistic. In the future,
maintaining high input systems will become increasingly difficult due
to reductions in the availability of required resources, such as water, oil,
and phosphorus. We acknowledge that there are numerous social and eco-
nomic issues (poverty, illiteracy, disease, politics) around the world that
contribute to the low productivity of regional cropping systems as well
as improvements in production management, and post-harvest handling
and storage that could be improved upon to decrease the pressures associ-
ated with feeding a swelling population. However for the purpose of this
