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Registered: May 2011

posted June 28, 2023 08:34 AM            

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There will be a continued increase in demand for food as the global population increases. In 2019, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the global population to be around 7.5 billion people. Their projections forecast 9.7 billion people on the planet by the year 2050.

That's 38% more people who will need to be fed off the same amount of land. To meet that increase in demand, food production will need to be 60% higher by 2050.

And to make matters worse, even if we do meet the demand, we have unsolved food waste. The average American eats roughly 1,996 pounds of food each year. Between farming, manufacturing, and grocery store waste, the United States throws out nearly 40 million tons of food every year. This food waste is estimated to be between 30–40 percent of the food supply. And it's not just us! Our neighbors in Canada toss out 35.5 million metric tons (just over 39 million tons) of food each year.

That food waste has consequences, as that means we have to produce lot more food which means we have to produce a lot more fertilizer. There's just one problem.

Fertilizer represents the biggest expense farmers have to absorb, and the demand for it is massive.

Demand is high because using just 176 pounds of nitrogen-based fertilizer per acre has been shown to increase yields by 342%. Thanks to this high efficiency, according to a study published in the scientific journal Nature, 48% of the world's population is dependent on nitrogen-based fertilizers for access to food. That means, according to Census Bureau numbers, 3.6 billion people were dependent on fertilizer for food in 2019 and nearly 4.7 billion people will be dependent on fertilizer for food by 2050.

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Posts: 3014
From:
Registered: May 2011

posted June 28, 2023 08:48 AM            

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One of the solution is better fertilizer. But at what cost?

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