Work

Emerging Alternatives to Mitigate Agricultural Fresh Water and Climate/Ecosystem Issues: Agricultural Revolutions

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: Fresh-water food production/agriculture for both plants and animals utilizes some 70% of the planets’ fresh water, produces some 26% of greenhouse gas emissions and has a longish list of other societal-related issues. Given the developing and extant shortages of arable land, fresh water and food, along with climate/ecosystem issues, there is a need to greatly reduce these adverse effects of fresh-water agriculture. There are, especially since the advent of the 4th Agricultural Revolution, a number of major frontier technologies and functionality changes along with prospective alternatives which could, when combined and collectivized in various ways, massively improve the practices, adverse impacts and outlook of food production. These include cellular/factory agriculture; photosynthesis alternatives; a shift to off-grids and roads/back-to-the-future, do-it-yourself living (aka de-urbanization); cultivation of halophytes on wastelands using saline water; insects; frontier energetics; health-related market changes; and vertical farms/hydroponics/aeroponics. Shifting to these and other prospective alternatives would utilize far less arable land and fresh water, produce far less greenhouse gases and reduce food costs and pollution while increasing food production.

Source: Water

DOI: 10.3390/w16243589

Author: Dennis M. Bushnell

Institution: Dynamique du noyau

Language: English

Topic: Agriculture Sustainability and Environmental Impact

Subfield: Ecology

Field: Environmental Science

Domain: Physical Sciences

SDGs: Climate action, Zero hunger, Responsible consumption and production

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,955