The
Crop Protection Associationhas expressed
dismay at recent comments by the Prince of Wales in which he
questioned the impact of modern farming practices on the
environment.
Delivering the prestigious
Richard Dimbleby Lecture earlier this month, Prince Charles
said that, while modern agriculture had made "enormous strides to
feed the burgeoning world's population", this was at a "huge and
unsustainable cost to ecosystems, through massive use of artificial
fertilisers, herbicides, pesticides and water".
"As an example, we put plenty of nitrogen on the fields to make
the crops grow quickly," he said "But, nitrogen being nitrogen, it
makes the weeds grow too, so out come all the herbicides. When it
drains into the streams, the nitrogen also makes the algae bloom,
which sucks all the oxygen out of the water, suffocating many of
the other forms of life in a vital food chain."
Prince Charles said this was "patently not durable", solving one
problem by creating countless others.
But
Dominic
Dyer, chief executive of the Crop Protection Association, said
the Prince's comments were "out of touch" with the enormous
challenge of securing the world's future food needs. The Prince had
failed to recognise the enormous progress made by the farming
industry to strike a sensible balance between productivity and
environmental protection.
"Everyone can agree that we need to protect natural resources
and prevent the damaging, irreversible effects of practices such as
deforestation," said Mr Dyer. "But we cannot ignore the
consequences of not producing enough food. Last year's soaring
grain prices and food riots were a wake up-call for the
international community - food security is the most basic necessity
of all."
Modern crop protection would continue to play a crucial role, he
insisted. "Use of pesticides today cannot be judged by the
prejudices of 30 or 40 years ago. Significant progress has been
made to research and develop safer, more environmentally benign
products that are target-specific, degrade quickly and do not
accumulate in the food chain.
"Responsible stewardship by the farming industry also ensures
that pesticides are used safely and effectively in the farmed
environment."
Global food consumption had outstripped production in seven of
the past nine years, said Mr Dyer. Every four seconds, the world
had an extra 10 mouths to feed, while the
FAO had recently revised the
number of malnourished people around the world upwards to more than
1 billion.
"These frightening statistics are the reason society needs to
re-think its attitude towards modern, science-based agriculture,"
said Mr Dyer.