What Are The Pros And Cons Of Green Revolution

Over the next forty years, global population is expected to reach nine billion people. This increase in population, combined with expected economic growth, will cause an increase in food demanded and inevitably drain the resources we use for food production. So far, agriculture has been able to respond positively to the rising demand for crop and livestock products. However, farmers are already faced with many new challenges associated with feeding an expanding global population. Farmers must now meet strict new emissions requirements and produce more food on fewer acres while minimizing their environmental footprint. The demand for food is expected to grow substantially in the next couple decades. Some of the factors affecting an increase in food demands are population growth, rising incomes of individuals, food supply factors, and biofuels.

The Green Revolution was a period of technological innovation in agriculture between the years 1943 and the 1970s. It was due to food becoming inadequate, and economic life became primitive and inactive. This was a time where disease ravaged, conditions were horrible, and hunger was common. Positively, the Green Revolution caused an increase in food supply, expansion into new technology, and provided social mobility. On the flip side, it also caused the necessity for more labor, and increased the need for cash incomes.

At this present moment, the standard of consumption had dramatically increased at an unprecedented rate, to the point where sources have zero time to replenish in order to coincide with the rate of consumption. It is predicated that in order to sustain a single Western’s lifestyle, 4-6 hectares of land is need per person.

The Green Revolution, which spanned across the mid 20th century from about the 1930s to the 1960s, encompassed a time when mass production, agricultural advances and the speed at which livestock were raised drove the production of food to a level which had never been seen before (Simmons). During these three or four decades, the production of food skyrocketed for multiple reasons such as advancements in how livestock was raised, pesticides, fertilizers and artificial selection (Simmons). Although there were some negative effects of the Green Revolution, such as the loss of polycultural production or a decreased quality of food, there were far more positive effects upon the world and its people, such as an increased availability of food, the decline of world hunger, an eventual increase in world population and general world stability (Simmons).

For the most part the earth’s population has increased relatively slowly but steady pace. In the past 120 years, however, the amount of people that need to be fed by our planet has increased tremendously from 1.5 billion to 7 billion. This dramatic increase may be because of agriculture itself. On a global scale food is nutritious and a lot easier to get than it was before.

These credit institutions mortgaged lands to farmers which in turn proved beneficial for these institutions as they could acquire these farms if the farmer was unable to the pay the loan (Ponting, 2007). One of the major advantages of the Green Revolution was that it increased the use of machinery on the farmlands (Bruce Koppel, 1987). Conclusion: Thus, it can be clearly said that the Green Revolution replaced, “one way of life with another within a short span of two decades.” due to its massive agricultural developments (Parayil, 1992). It was a major achievement when it was implemented in the developing countries as it gave them a sense of food security after the end of the World War-2. It got many people out of poverty and hunger and while this was focussed on, it also dropped down the prices for food, increased migration, generated employment and the increased economy as well. Agriculture research still needs new research to tackle the upcoming problems related to increasing yields to feed the ever-growing population and growth of food for the developing countries. Add to that, globalization and trade will make food prices less liable to local food produce and agriculture will not be as important for people

With the world’s population continuing to increase, the demand for food is higher than ever. A growing population means more demand on food. “The world population will rise to 9.3 billion in 2050 and surpass 10 billion by the end of this century.” (Sanyal) This should say something about our growing population that is still continuing to grow to this day. This increase in food demand also calls for more efficient ways of growing and providing food without causing any damage to our environment or our health. Two methods that can be effective for this demand are the organic and conventional method.

The growth of industrialization and of the population were one cause of the Green Revolution. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 2005, wheat yields in Mexico increased about 3,500 yields per hectare of wheat, and about 2,400 yields in India, from the year 1950 to 2010. During these years, mechanization continued and made it easier to

In this regard, studies show that famine has been reduced 20% in this period (Brownell, 2008), food supply raised 12-13% between 1960 and 1990, whereas without the new technologies food production were decreased around 20% and price was increased 35-65%. The other research in Asia shows that with 1% increase in production, the numbers of poor people decrease by 0.48% (Pingali, 2012). Furthermore, green revolution has had a great influence on labor’s life and provided opportunities for them to improve their life. In fact, this revolution has affected labors in some terms such as employment and wage. As I noted above, green revolution has increased productivity, so bulk density of generated plants enhance the need for extra labors for fertilizing, transplantation and weeding (Das,

Although, many people will argue that the Green Revolution wasn’t a success in the developing countries and negatively affected the economic status and environmental safety of the country. Many people say that the green revolution only benefited the rich people, who are in charge, by getting them richer and the poor laborers only getting poorer. They also bring up that the run-off from the pesticides used to artificially make the crops went into the rivers and polluted the clean drinking water for the lower-class people leading to many new diseases spreading. However, science advancements in the field of agriculture and the overall economic growth of the whole country helped the Green Revolution be a success.

There have been many adverse changes to the global environment, and the life around it is being threatened by Global warming. Green Technology can help prevent global disaster and improve the ways we produce organic material to recycle cleaner material for a better world. Without the use of green cleaner technology, there have been changes to the world such as global warming, and its harder to prevent that if the cost of green technology is high making it harder for people and business to obtain green technology. There are also people that worried that Green technology is not as efficient and are uncertain about performance.

Today, the contemporary world is riddled with several developing, uncertainties with the food security. World population is growing faster, by researching world population by 2050 it will reach 9 billion people on this Earth. Food requirement is expected at over 70% of current levels. Sustainability is important for the food because, it is achieving the level against price rising prices of food, included climate change because climate change is also a huge problem for farmers. Sustainability is important for food and people should never waste food. There are so many problems for the sustainability and solutions to sustain food for the future generations. There are many problems like food crisis, wastage of food, shortage of food and price rising, I will be writing about those problems and solutions that can help solve the problems.

While human fertility does appear to be declining, world population is expected to reach ten times that of year 1800, with an expected 10 billion people by the late 21 century (Bongaarts 2009). An increase in human population and related natural resource depletion and environmental degradation are cause for global concern. There are a number of challenges to managing natural resources given the increases in human population today and into the future. The relationship between population growth and environmental degradation is apparent in the increasing energy demands, air and water pollution and loss of biodiversity. Additionally important is the necessity to maintain sustainable food crops for growing populations. Meeting the needs of a growing population has enormous bearing on how and where this resource retrieval will affect biodiversity and the sustainability of natural resources. Increasing global human population will have interchanging effects on ecosystem services; create difficulties in the ability to produce adequate levels of sustainable food through crop production and hunting; place increasing pressures on land for human habitation; create a greater potential for human-wildlife conflict; and most urgently, increase the potential for climate change effects as a result of human-induced activities that result in emissions of greenhouse gases.

To be able to support and provide for the growing population, countries must maximize production of food, however there is a limit of availability of arable land, water and fossil fuels which make this initiative difficult to fulfill.

The Green Revolution hopes to avert global hunger crises by enabling developing nations to be self sufficient. The goal is to replace old agricultural traditions with newer Western practices. Developing nations can increase their total yields by using genetically engineered seeds, large irrigation projects, and prolific quantities of fertilizer. The aim of this paper is examine the methods of the Green Revolution, and their effects on the soils of the Punjab region in India.