Showing papers by "James S. Gerber published in 2013"
TL;DR: In this article, the authors re-examine agricultural productivity and find that growing food exclusively for direct human consumption could increase available food calories by as much as 70% which could feed an additional 4 billion people (more than the projected 2.3 billion people arriving through population growth).
Abstract: Worldwide demand for crops is increasing rapidly due to global population growth, increased biofuel production, and changing dietary preferences. Meeting these growing demands will be a substantial challenge that will tax the capability of our food system and prompt calls to dramatically boost global crop production. However, to increase food availability, we may also consider how the world’s crops are allocated to different uses and whether it is possible to feed more people with current levels of crop production. Of particular interest are the uses of crops as animal feed and as biofuel feedstocks. Currently, 36% of the calories produced by the world’s crops are being used for animal feed, and only 12% of those feed calories ultimately contribute to the human diet (as meat and other animal products). Additionally, human-edible calories used for biofuel production increased fourfold between the years 2000 and 2010, from 1% to 4%, representing a net reduction of available food globally. In this study, we re-examine agricultural productivity, going from using the standard definition of yield (in tonnes per hectare, or similar units) to using the number of people actually fed per hectare of cropland. We find that, given the current mix of crop uses, growing food exclusively for direct human consumption could, in principle, increase available food calories by as much as 70%, which could feed an additional 4 billion people (more than the projected 2‐3 billion people arriving through population growth). Even small shifts in our allocation of crops to animal feed and biofuels could significantly increase global food availability, and could be an instrumental tool in meeting the challenges of ensuring global food security.
482 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors compare global agro-climatic zonation schemes for suitability to up-scale location-specific estimates of Yp and Yw, which are the basis for estimating yield gaps at regional, national, and global scales.
249 citations
TL;DR: A minor error in the mapping program used to generate Fig. 1 incorrectly displayed reduced yield gap estimates across a few areas; this was most apparent in the Sahel region of Africa.
Abstract: Nature 490, 254–257 (2012); doi:10.1038/nature11420 In this Letter, a minor error in the mapping program used to generate Fig. 1 incorrectly displayed reduced yield gap estimates across a few areas; this was most apparent in the Sahel region of Africa. The corrected Fig. 1 is shown below. This errordoes not affect the results or conclusion of the paper, and has been corrected in the HTML and PDF of the original paper.
36 citations