Many lower-income countries do, but high and middle-income countries have reduced fertilisers, pesticides, labour, and land without reducing food production.
One factor that you don't really touch on is energy input. Much of the gains have been due to increased mechanisation driving productivity. It has ben a massive benefit, but we may be nearing a peak there. Oil prices are high, and still rising, and at the same time there is a realisation that deep ploughing damages the soil. So far we aren't seeing much penetration of battery power in agriculture, but I can see that it can happen. No-plough techniques open up an opportunity for lighter machines, whilst autonomous tractors can be shrunk that bit more as the cab is removed and the gearboxes and steering rationalised. Already hand-held equipment is switching fast to battery power, as it reduces the weight and the maintenance cost and this change should move up the rest of the farm machinery chain.
The next stage, which is heralded but not yet really here, is using drones to monitor crops and apply targeted treatment. That will be especially applicable to small plots allowing farmers to exploit land that is unsuitable for heavy machines, and being able to manage fields that are simple rectangles. This might be the area where China and developing countries will really have an opportunity to leapfrog the high and middle income economies.
There are many improvements in farm equipment, from the common already use of GPS semi autonomous tractors, satellites and drones for tracking growth, water and fertilizer use, and new robotic pest control which uses AI cameras to identify newly sprouting weeds and powerful lasers to kill them to eliminate needs for herbicides. Robot pickers will be needed to reduce labor inputs. One instance of this is Dyson’s automated strawberry farm, which is not yet practical, but may soon be.
You mention in passing the land dedicated to production of animal feeds. Also, you do not consider the effects of modern large- scale monocultures on biodiversity, the most striking finding being the 70% decline in insect populations in Germany, also found elsewhere. I'll never forget a beekeeping course I went on when a participant said he was concerned about exposure to the cold in the Peak District. The tutor said it was not that, but that he lived in a desert: there were hardly any flowering plants. In England, where there are 20 million sheep, cities are safer for bee populations.
Fertiliser use- and consequent eutrophication and GHG emissions could be brought down considerably by the phasing out of meat production. This would be a huge cultural change, but it would benefit humanity immensely. Fir both these reasons governments have no interest in such action.
Most people don’t live in those countries, and the others aren’t loosing their appetite for meat, global meat production increased from 317 million metric tons in 2016 to 351 million metric tons last year, increasing by 10.6%.
You are right, although as they develop they may follow the trend of developed countries. This is a UK source, but surveying the prospects for world markets - https://ahdb.org.uk/knowledge-library/what-s-the-long-term-outlook-for-beef-and-sheep-meat-consumption As ever it is development in China that is driving it. Don't know about India. Modi should be promoting vegetarianism but his followers may no agree.
Thanks Dr. Ritchie for such an interesting article. Is it possible that the huge difference between China and the rest of the countries in fertilizer use could be because it's counted per hectare, and rice has two and even three crops per year? The non-rice countries have only one per year. Second question: Why is infamous the Cui et al study?
Awesome data as always! I think TFP is a great way to explain how all things work - but it's a great way to better understand agriculture. Precision application, as you note, is just as much know-how as technology. Lots of things to learn from governments changing subsidies to encourage better practices.
Would love to see how some of this would interact with expected crop yield decreases from higher global temperatures. Assuming there will be similar TFP winners/losers like drought-resistant seeds etc?
Great piece, thank you. I’m thinking that the irrigation piece in established ag lands will become more limiting w climate change. Much of the prime ag land is irrigated either thru surface water distribution (reservoirs), which rely on seasonal refilling from rain/snowmelt, or thru groundwater withdrawals that either mine old water or rely on rechargeable aquifers.
With atmospheric warming (warm air holds/retains more moisture) we’re seeing a lot of increased variability in snow packs and reservoir refills. Snowmelts are occurring earlier and faster such that they’re not able to be captured, so water supplies may not be available for late season calls.
Groundwater is seeing increased competition between ag and domestic use, as rapid urbanization (population shifts from small rural towns to urban centers) in many cases is leading to increased non-ag withdrawals. This is pressure on what may already be threatened supplies.
What no one really knows is how the pressures from climate change will result in shifting ag production to newly viable farmland, while current land slowly leaves production.
Global Population is spluttering and stagnating at around 8 billion with regular downgrades by agencies including UNPD.
Those opposed to 'population growth' a la old Rockefeller fosssil fuel ZPG Zero Population Growth and MAGA Tanton Network claimed the 'green revolution' was responsible for feeding larger numbers.
However no evidence, it's more education and empowerment of women which has had much to do with falling fertility and longevity slowing down population growth, markedly.
Also helped along by birth control, urbanization, labor saving devices that allow women to work outside the home and reduce the need for children to help run small farms.
Really enjoyed reading this article Hannah, and I'm sorry I haven't stopped to read much in your substack before this. Very enlightening. I'll cite it in an article on project management and sustainability that I'm writing in Project Management World Journal (this one due out in September edition)
What do you think about slowing population growth and food consumption? I know you did a piece recently about how falling population won't impact climate much, but I think the arguments apply better to food production.
Also, what do you think of Jesús Fernández-Villaverde's presentation that the UN low population projections is a better projection of future growth? If the UN low fertility scenario is to be believed, population will only grow by ~8% at peak before falling.
And as the developed world expands, and calorie consumption from low levels increases, maybe the widespread use of GLP1 agonists will further reduce per capita calorie consumption, helping to keep down both demand for food and obesity rates.
We must interfere with nature to survive, just as we must eat to interfere with starvation. Any pollution on the way is a harm to property matter. But there is very little respect for property in collectivist societies since a "public" standing is morally superior to a "private" standing. In fact, there's very little respect for one's self, since one's value depends on the value of someone else. This is the cause of "pollution" and negligence, not chemicals, pesticides, or power plant emissions.
[I suspect "George Chiappino" is not here to be persuaded, so this is for uncommitted lurkers -MA]
Uh, no. If we're tracing the deepest-underlying cause of "pollution" including anthropogenic global warming, it's all due to the "free" market's ancient propensity to externalize, i.e. *socialize*, as much private transaction cost as it can get away with. That isn't new with Capitalism. What's new are the global scope of the cumulative socialized costs, even now being paid in money and grief; and the vast profits accruing to fossil carbon producers and investors, by keeping those cost off their books.
Global warming is in a class of economic problems named "The Tragedy of the Commons". Economists across the political spectrum agree that only collective action, or "mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon" (G. Hardin), can bring fossil carbon emissions to zero and cap the rising trend of GMST, along with the net social cost. "Collective action" doesn 't mean collectivist societies, nor are any real societies either collectivist or not! It just means allowing government to give the "invisible hand" of the energy market a push from the "visible hand" of collective intervention, directing it to build out the carbon-neutral national economy.
There is a range of available public policy tools, including direct carbon pricing (preferred by economists), incentives for renewable energy production and/or consumer uptake (preferred by Democratic politicians), or even command-and-control regulation (preferred by nobody AFAICT). All collective action is on a slippery slope, but without it, the global net cost of climate change is *open-ended*! IMHO, it's folly not to face that simple fact! The SCOTUS has said "the Constitution is not a suicide pact". Seems like pretty clear authorization to act collectively, to me.
The US "Inflation Reduction Act" of 2022 was a small step in that direction, representing the first US decarbonization policy to be enacted in the almost 40 years we've all known about global warming. Alas, the decarbonization provisions of the IRA are out the window now. Hell, the US EPA now wants to abolish its legal authority to regulate CO2 emissions! The bottom line is that the US will ride free on the collective decarbonization actions of other nations, at least until the next Democratic POTUS.
I'm not sure I agree with anything you have written. In societies where money (piles of bits of paper with pictures of dead people on them) isn't the sole objective, there is huge respect for common property - the https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/seventh-generation-principle emphasises that decisions should take into account everything that affects future generations.
Humans survived for millennia without destroying everything. In fact many many societies still do. It's possible that all the mess we now face is the result of a single tribe or region with a number of tribes in, who progressively expanded in Northern Europe through Germany, France, Britain and Russia, meanwhile the occupants of many other countries were quite content to run complex and sophisticated empires without being acquisitive (the deep and culturally rich empires in South America, China, India are just some of many examples).
So it's actually a small number of people who do an outsize amount of damage, and everyone else wants a lovely world for ourselves and our grandchildren. A Garden of Eden perhaps, where humans are stewards rather than destroyers?
Wow, awesome piece! Your point about total aggregate inputs still increasing I think is interesting and worthy of deeper exploration. So assuming we still keep trying to ratchet up food production (through increasing current farmland yields, not land clearing), albeit more and more efficiently, the amount of total inputs will grow. Pairing this with the fact that we are past peak farmland, and acknowledging peak population will be hit (short of some drastic cultural shift) in this century/the next, could we arrive at a point of total TFP efficiency?
"And yet you fail to mention the huge and uncontestable benefits the increase in Co² has had on crop yield and the greening of the earth!"
I submitted that to chat ChatGPTs "Post Comment Reply Generator", i.e. the auto-fisker. Here's the result (https://chatgpt.com/share/68880b44-de44-8013-a6ca-5826796cd852). It's pretty much the reply I'd make based on my own knowledge. Generative AI takes the tedium out of whack-a-troll!
"Yes, higher CO₂ has contributed to ~12% global greening over the past 40 years (NASA), mainly through longer growing seasons and fertilization. But here's the rest of the picture:
" - Heat extremes linked to rising CO₂ have already cut wheat and maize yields by 4–6% globally (IPCC, 2021).
" - CO₂ boosts growth, but lowers nutrient content in staple crops like rice and wheat (Harvard/PNAS, 2018).
" - By 2050, climate-related disruptions could reduce global crop yields by up to 25% without strong mitigation (FAO).
" - And greening ≠ food security. Most greening is in boreal forests and marginal lands, not core crop zones."
"So yes, CO₂ has benefits — but pretending it's all upside is like praising rain during a flood."
Very interesting article, it's good that inputs are declining in certain places however do more modern concentrated pesticides and herbacides cause the same environmental damage for less input? I don't know enough about the topic to know!
Please stop using "a lot" in your wriitngs. You have a PHd, but no one, not one professor, ever told you that's grammatically poor? You lose a little (or, maybe "a lot") of credibility when you use that in these scientific breakdowns.
I completely disagree with this. As a non-native English speaker, I greatly appreciate the accessibility and ease of Hannah’s writing — please Hannah, if you read this, don’t change your style of writing a bit, but keep your wonderful world of data comprehensible for the ones of us that didn’t go to Oxford!!
Another amazing and important collection of inconvenient truths.
As always, thanks for pushing back against the Doomer Cult, Hannah.
One factor that you don't really touch on is energy input. Much of the gains have been due to increased mechanisation driving productivity. It has ben a massive benefit, but we may be nearing a peak there. Oil prices are high, and still rising, and at the same time there is a realisation that deep ploughing damages the soil. So far we aren't seeing much penetration of battery power in agriculture, but I can see that it can happen. No-plough techniques open up an opportunity for lighter machines, whilst autonomous tractors can be shrunk that bit more as the cab is removed and the gearboxes and steering rationalised. Already hand-held equipment is switching fast to battery power, as it reduces the weight and the maintenance cost and this change should move up the rest of the farm machinery chain.
The next stage, which is heralded but not yet really here, is using drones to monitor crops and apply targeted treatment. That will be especially applicable to small plots allowing farmers to exploit land that is unsuitable for heavy machines, and being able to manage fields that are simple rectangles. This might be the area where China and developing countries will really have an opportunity to leapfrog the high and middle income economies.
There are many improvements in farm equipment, from the common already use of GPS semi autonomous tractors, satellites and drones for tracking growth, water and fertilizer use, and new robotic pest control which uses AI cameras to identify newly sprouting weeds and powerful lasers to kill them to eliminate needs for herbicides. Robot pickers will be needed to reduce labor inputs. One instance of this is Dyson’s automated strawberry farm, which is not yet practical, but may soon be.
https://youtu.be/FA6BCIWPJ30?si=xQzOjqg_FkfFxNcp
You mention in passing the land dedicated to production of animal feeds. Also, you do not consider the effects of modern large- scale monocultures on biodiversity, the most striking finding being the 70% decline in insect populations in Germany, also found elsewhere. I'll never forget a beekeeping course I went on when a participant said he was concerned about exposure to the cold in the Peak District. The tutor said it was not that, but that he lived in a desert: there were hardly any flowering plants. In England, where there are 20 million sheep, cities are safer for bee populations.
Fertiliser use- and consequent eutrophication and GHG emissions could be brought down considerably by the phasing out of meat production. This would be a huge cultural change, but it would benefit humanity immensely. Fir both these reasons governments have no interest in such action.
It is happening.
Meat consumption in most developed countries is plateaued. Probably not true for the USA. In the UK meat consumption per head is at the lowest since records began. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/24/uk-meat-consumption-lowest-level-since-record-began-data-reveal Culture change like this take time, but its per decade rather than per generation.
Most people don’t live in those countries, and the others aren’t loosing their appetite for meat, global meat production increased from 317 million metric tons in 2016 to 351 million metric tons last year, increasing by 10.6%.
You are right, although as they develop they may follow the trend of developed countries. This is a UK source, but surveying the prospects for world markets - https://ahdb.org.uk/knowledge-library/what-s-the-long-term-outlook-for-beef-and-sheep-meat-consumption As ever it is development in China that is driving it. Don't know about India. Modi should be promoting vegetarianism but his followers may no agree.
Thanks Dr. Ritchie for such an interesting article. Is it possible that the huge difference between China and the rest of the countries in fertilizer use could be because it's counted per hectare, and rice has two and even three crops per year? The non-rice countries have only one per year. Second question: Why is infamous the Cui et al study?
Awesome data as always! I think TFP is a great way to explain how all things work - but it's a great way to better understand agriculture. Precision application, as you note, is just as much know-how as technology. Lots of things to learn from governments changing subsidies to encourage better practices.
Would love to see how some of this would interact with expected crop yield decreases from higher global temperatures. Assuming there will be similar TFP winners/losers like drought-resistant seeds etc?
Great piece, thank you. I’m thinking that the irrigation piece in established ag lands will become more limiting w climate change. Much of the prime ag land is irrigated either thru surface water distribution (reservoirs), which rely on seasonal refilling from rain/snowmelt, or thru groundwater withdrawals that either mine old water or rely on rechargeable aquifers.
With atmospheric warming (warm air holds/retains more moisture) we’re seeing a lot of increased variability in snow packs and reservoir refills. Snowmelts are occurring earlier and faster such that they’re not able to be captured, so water supplies may not be available for late season calls.
Groundwater is seeing increased competition between ag and domestic use, as rapid urbanization (population shifts from small rural towns to urban centers) in many cases is leading to increased non-ag withdrawals. This is pressure on what may already be threatened supplies.
What no one really knows is how the pressures from climate change will result in shifting ag production to newly viable farmland, while current land slowly leaves production.
Global Population is spluttering and stagnating at around 8 billion with regular downgrades by agencies including UNPD.
Those opposed to 'population growth' a la old Rockefeller fosssil fuel ZPG Zero Population Growth and MAGA Tanton Network claimed the 'green revolution' was responsible for feeding larger numbers.
However no evidence, it's more education and empowerment of women which has had much to do with falling fertility and longevity slowing down population growth, markedly.
Also helped along by birth control, urbanization, labor saving devices that allow women to work outside the home and reduce the need for children to help run small farms.
Really enjoyed reading this article Hannah, and I'm sorry I haven't stopped to read much in your substack before this. Very enlightening. I'll cite it in an article on project management and sustainability that I'm writing in Project Management World Journal (this one due out in September edition)
Good and important point!
What do you think about slowing population growth and food consumption? I know you did a piece recently about how falling population won't impact climate much, but I think the arguments apply better to food production.
Also, what do you think of Jesús Fernández-Villaverde's presentation that the UN low population projections is a better projection of future growth? If the UN low fertility scenario is to be believed, population will only grow by ~8% at peak before falling.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7_e_A_vFnk
And as the developed world expands, and calorie consumption from low levels increases, maybe the widespread use of GLP1 agonists will further reduce per capita calorie consumption, helping to keep down both demand for food and obesity rates.
We must interfere with nature to survive, just as we must eat to interfere with starvation. Any pollution on the way is a harm to property matter. But there is very little respect for property in collectivist societies since a "public" standing is morally superior to a "private" standing. In fact, there's very little respect for one's self, since one's value depends on the value of someone else. This is the cause of "pollution" and negligence, not chemicals, pesticides, or power plant emissions.
[I suspect "George Chiappino" is not here to be persuaded, so this is for uncommitted lurkers -MA]
Uh, no. If we're tracing the deepest-underlying cause of "pollution" including anthropogenic global warming, it's all due to the "free" market's ancient propensity to externalize, i.e. *socialize*, as much private transaction cost as it can get away with. That isn't new with Capitalism. What's new are the global scope of the cumulative socialized costs, even now being paid in money and grief; and the vast profits accruing to fossil carbon producers and investors, by keeping those cost off their books.
Global warming is in a class of economic problems named "The Tragedy of the Commons". Economists across the political spectrum agree that only collective action, or "mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon" (G. Hardin), can bring fossil carbon emissions to zero and cap the rising trend of GMST, along with the net social cost. "Collective action" doesn 't mean collectivist societies, nor are any real societies either collectivist or not! It just means allowing government to give the "invisible hand" of the energy market a push from the "visible hand" of collective intervention, directing it to build out the carbon-neutral national economy.
There is a range of available public policy tools, including direct carbon pricing (preferred by economists), incentives for renewable energy production and/or consumer uptake (preferred by Democratic politicians), or even command-and-control regulation (preferred by nobody AFAICT). All collective action is on a slippery slope, but without it, the global net cost of climate change is *open-ended*! IMHO, it's folly not to face that simple fact! The SCOTUS has said "the Constitution is not a suicide pact". Seems like pretty clear authorization to act collectively, to me.
The US "Inflation Reduction Act" of 2022 was a small step in that direction, representing the first US decarbonization policy to be enacted in the almost 40 years we've all known about global warming. Alas, the decarbonization provisions of the IRA are out the window now. Hell, the US EPA now wants to abolish its legal authority to regulate CO2 emissions! The bottom line is that the US will ride free on the collective decarbonization actions of other nations, at least until the next Democratic POTUS.
I'm not sure I agree with anything you have written. In societies where money (piles of bits of paper with pictures of dead people on them) isn't the sole objective, there is huge respect for common property - the https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/seventh-generation-principle emphasises that decisions should take into account everything that affects future generations.
Humans survived for millennia without destroying everything. In fact many many societies still do. It's possible that all the mess we now face is the result of a single tribe or region with a number of tribes in, who progressively expanded in Northern Europe through Germany, France, Britain and Russia, meanwhile the occupants of many other countries were quite content to run complex and sophisticated empires without being acquisitive (the deep and culturally rich empires in South America, China, India are just some of many examples).
So it's actually a small number of people who do an outsize amount of damage, and everyone else wants a lovely world for ourselves and our grandchildren. A Garden of Eden perhaps, where humans are stewards rather than destroyers?
Wow, awesome piece! Your point about total aggregate inputs still increasing I think is interesting and worthy of deeper exploration. So assuming we still keep trying to ratchet up food production (through increasing current farmland yields, not land clearing), albeit more and more efficiently, the amount of total inputs will grow. Pairing this with the fact that we are past peak farmland, and acknowledging peak population will be hit (short of some drastic cultural shift) in this century/the next, could we arrive at a point of total TFP efficiency?
And yet you fail to mention the huge and uncontestable benefits the increase in Co² has had on crop yield and the greening of the earth!
Why would that be?
"And yet you fail to mention the huge and uncontestable benefits the increase in Co² has had on crop yield and the greening of the earth!"
I submitted that to chat ChatGPTs "Post Comment Reply Generator", i.e. the auto-fisker. Here's the result (https://chatgpt.com/share/68880b44-de44-8013-a6ca-5826796cd852). It's pretty much the reply I'd make based on my own knowledge. Generative AI takes the tedium out of whack-a-troll!
"Yes, higher CO₂ has contributed to ~12% global greening over the past 40 years (NASA), mainly through longer growing seasons and fertilization. But here's the rest of the picture:
" - Heat extremes linked to rising CO₂ have already cut wheat and maize yields by 4–6% globally (IPCC, 2021).
" - CO₂ boosts growth, but lowers nutrient content in staple crops like rice and wheat (Harvard/PNAS, 2018).
" - By 2050, climate-related disruptions could reduce global crop yields by up to 25% without strong mitigation (FAO).
" - And greening ≠ food security. Most greening is in boreal forests and marginal lands, not core crop zones."
"So yes, CO₂ has benefits — but pretending it's all upside is like praising rain during a flood."
Very interesting article, it's good that inputs are declining in certain places however do more modern concentrated pesticides and herbacides cause the same environmental damage for less input? I don't know enough about the topic to know!
Please stop using "a lot" in your wriitngs. You have a PHd, but no one, not one professor, ever told you that's grammatically poor? You lose a little (or, maybe "a lot") of credibility when you use that in these scientific breakdowns.
I completely disagree with this. As a non-native English speaker, I greatly appreciate the accessibility and ease of Hannah’s writing — please Hannah, if you read this, don’t change your style of writing a bit, but keep your wonderful world of data comprehensible for the ones of us that didn’t go to Oxford!!
It seems like you are measuring growth in productivity by monetary value, not by nutritional value. That obscures the issue rather than clarifying.
Have you read Regenesis, by George Monbiot? Sounds like you agree on some points