US professor Pamela Ronald will be at the NZBIO conference in
Auckland tomorrow to talk about how organic farming and genetic
engineering can contribute to sustainable agriculture. Ronald, a
professor of plant pathology at the University of California,
Davis, will talk about her book, Tomorrow's Table, co-authored
with her organic farmer husband. "I will give some examples of
how we're thinking of sustainable agricultural systems and how
organic production and genetically engineered crops can
contribute to a future sustainable agriculture,' Ronald said.
"Actually I went into plant genetics because of my concern for
agriculture and the environment." The global population was
projected to grow from about 7 billion today to reach 9.2
billion by 2050, Ronald said. "Approximately we have to produce
twice as much food by then so the critical issue is how can we
do that without destroying the environment any more than we have
already." Cotton farming used 25 per cent of the world's
insecticides but farmers in Arizon