How Many Can Live On Planet Earth? Pt 3

Part three of the six part series explores the importance of water from another angle: the production of food. Without enough water there is not enough food. Huge fresh water reservoirs are being drained at an alarming rate, not only for drinking water but for food crops. We are going to need to double the productivity of available land if we are to feed the coming billions of more people in the next fifty years.

Mechanization, fertilizers and new varieties of crops in the preceeding century increased yields dramatically, but with available land reaching a plateau, water resources shrinking quickly and subsistence farming plots being diminished by large families, it is clear that crop production and fresh water will no longer be able to keep pace with increases in populations.

Developed countries such as China and England are already purchasing land in Africa for exporting food back to their own countries, leaving the poorer African nations even fewer resources to feed their own exploding populations. 




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