AAP General News (Australia)
04-19-1999
SA: Food a global security issue, conference told
By Valkerie Mangnall
ADELAIDE, April 19 AAP - Food, land and water shortages were playing an increasing role in
triggering wars widely regarded by the media up to now as ethnic or religious in origin, a
CSIRO expert said today.
The Director of National Awareness for the CSIRO, Julian Cribb, said the dangers of
conflict arising out of food, land and water shortages was a serious dilemma confronting the
world.
Mr Cribb said the world must grow more food over the next 30 years than in the whole of
history or conflicts would multiply.
He said there had been 103 conflicts around the world in the past eight years and the
majority of those had been over issues related to food, land and water.
"These conflicts are likely to get worse, are likely to multiply unless we do something
about the need to supply those people with sufficient food," Mr Cribb told AAP.
"Agricultural research is in fact the defence spending of the 21st century. These things
are at the core of international security and stability."
He was speaking before an address to the 11th Australian Plant Breeding Conference and said
while a focus on providing enough food to feed the world would not make all religious disputes
disappear, it would remove one of the major causes of war.
Mr Cribb said Australia had a major role to play in teaching the world how to produce
enough food and manage their resources because many other developed countries had wound down
their agricultural research.
"America and Europe have got domestic food surpluses so they're not putting any effort into
agricultural research anymore because they don't see the need," he said.
And while America and Europe had different climates to most of the rest of the world,
Australia's wide range of climates and environments allowed it to lead the way in research
efforts.
"This is our golden opportunity. Our exports of agricultural knowledge are going to be the
way we make our living in the 21st century. It's something we are very, very good at," Mr
Cribb said.
AAP vm/kr
KEYWORD: PLANTS
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