Feeding everybody in the world has always been a challenge. Feeding them well just got even tougher.
Some of the most important crops that people grow — wheat, barley, rice, beans — deliver a lot less nutrition when there’s more carbon dioxide in the air, according to a new study in the journal Nature. The scientists grew rice, wheat, maize, soybeans, field peas and sorghum with carbon dioxide turned up to approximately double the pre-industrial atmospheric level, which the atmosphere could hit late this century.
They’re not sure why plants aren’t taking up the nutrients. The fact that it happens at all is sobering. “The public health implications of global climate change are difficult to predict,” the authors write, “and we expect many surprises.”
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This is one of them. The researchers suggest that by being aware of the problem, people can now better predict and prepare for it. That could mean aggressive breeding, dietary supplements or “biofortification” — jargonese for techniques and technologies that include food that’s been genetically modified, known as GMOs. GMOs could help people adapt to life in a high-carbon world by supplying missing nutrients. That’s an iron-fortified pickle for anyone fighting against both climate change and GMOs.
Read the full, original article: New Study Makes It Harder for Activists to Be Against Everything All the Time
