LOS BAÑOS, Laguna — An international biotechnology company is set to establish a $10-million grant to accelerate breakthrough public sector research in rice and wheat yield.

Monsanto Co. announced a three-point commitment to help increase global food production in the face of growing demand, limited natural resources, and a changing climate.

The global firm pledged to work in new partnership with governments, businesses, and citizen groups to meet one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century.

“Agriculture intersects the toughest challenge we all face on the planet,” Hugh Grand, Monsanto chairman, president and chief executive officer, stressed as he announced the research grant and commitment to help address the needs of the global population, which is expected to reach nine billion people by 2050.

Grant added: “Together, we must meet the needs for increased food, fiber, and energy while protecting the environment. In short, the world needs to produce more while conserving more.”

A copy of a report on the three-point commitment and research grant was furnished The STAR by Dr. Victor V. Alpuerto, Commercial Acceptance director of Monsanto, during a “Media Workshop and Study Visit on Biotechnology and Biodiversity” held here recently.

The workshop was organized and supported by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCARRD), Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture-Biotechnology Information Service (SEARCA-BIC), and University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB) (sic).

Monsanto’s three-point commitment to growing yields sustainably covers the following:

• Develop better seeds. The company will double yield in its three core crops of corn, soybean, and cotton by 2030, compare to a base year of 2000.

To backstop this thrust is a $10-million grant designed to accelerate breakthrough public sector research in wheat and rice yield.

The five-year grant for rice and wheat research will be administered by a panel of world experts in food production in developing countries. The chairperson of the panel will be named in the near future.

A panel of independent judges will select one project per year to receive a $2-million grant. Further details on the program will be developed and announced in the coming months.

• Conserve resources. Monsanto will develop seeds that will reduce by one-third the amount of key resources required to grow crops by 2000. It will also join with others to address habitat loss and water quality in agriculturally important areas.

• Help improve farmers’ lives.

“We are undertaking this initiative after engaging many of our farmer-customers, policymakers, scientists, nongovernment organizations (NGOs), and experts in academic and industry. We asked them what agriculture must do to become more sustainable, and our commitment reflects how we will put their advice into action,” Grant said.

He noted that the world is facing significant food price inflation for the first time in decades, driven largely by the demand for higher protein diets in such countries as China and India and energy prices that have quadrupled over the past five years.

Exports say it will be necessary to produce as much food between now and 2050 as has been produce in the past 10,000 years.

“As agriculture uses 70 percent of the world’s fresh water and more than half of the habitable land, much of the production increase must come from increased crop yields,” Grant stressed.

Concern over climate change has also increased, with experts noting that the eight warmest years on record have all occurred in the past decade.

Grant said the quality of life for the world’s one billion farmers is an important part of this equation. This includes both commercial farmers and the tens of millions of resource-poor farmers who survive on less than $2 per day.

He said Monsanto spends an average of more than $2 million a day on agricultural research. Yet he noted that partnerships with others are essential to developing and delivering approaches to these global challenges.

NOTE FROM SEARCA BIC: The co-organizers of ‘Media Workshop on Biotechnology and Biodiversity’ were the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCARRD), Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture-Biotechnology Information Service (SEARCA-BIC), and the USAID Philippines.

See related article:
Monsanto leads $47-M corn research