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03 Oct 08

Plant Tweak Could Let Toxic Soil Feed Millions | Wired Science from Wired.com

UC Riverside scientists have a breakthrough that would allow genetic engineering to enable plants to become tolerant of aluminum toxicity. Apparently, much of the world's potentially arable land has that aluminum toxicity, and therefore can't be used for food production. Ths would circumvent that problem, and possibly signal a breakthrough into the second wave of a Green Revolution. (The first one has kind of reached its limits.)

blog.wired.com/...plant-tweak-cou.html - Preview

wired_magazine agriculture bioneering genetic_engineering food crops paul_larsen

  • "Aluminum toxicity is a very limiting factor, especially in developing
    countries, in South America and Africa and Indonesia," said biochemist Paul Larsen. "It's not like these
    areas are devoid of plant life, but they're not crop plants. Among
    agriculturally important plants, there aren't mechanisms for aluminum
    tolerance." 
  • There's no more room for farms in the developed world; demand for cropland is fueling deforestation in the rain forests of Latin America and Africa; and the limits of the Green Revolution, which increased global food production through the use of pesticides and industrial farming techniques, have been reached. Another revolution, say agronomists, is needed.
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19 Jan 08

An Oil Quandary: Costly Fuel Means Costly Calories - New York Times

NYT article on the problems around "the other oil crisis," triggered not in small measure by our (West's) desire to circumvent fossil fuel dependence by relying on biofuels.

www.nytimes.com/...19palmoil.html - Preview

crops energy ethanol food fuel geopolitics oil palm_oil

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