A Look at Farming in 2050
By Patrick Ramsay
In 2050, farming may be moving to the city. Today, with over 7 billion human mouths to feed, approximately 40% of this planet’s total landmass is used for agriculture to produce the quantity of food necessary to sustain our world’s population. By the year 2050, the world population is expected to grow to 9.6 billion and according to the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), food production will have to increase by 70 percent in order to avoid mass malnutrition.
Using less water, while at the same time producing more crops will be essential in addressing water scarcity problems as the demand for water will also increase with the population. Land will also play a pivotal role in feeding a world with 2.3 billion more people. Sufficient global land resources are available to feed future population, but much of the land is in areas riddled with obstacles like insufficient infrastructure and endemic diseases. These obstacles aren’t impossible to overcome, but it will prove difficult to use much of the available land for agriculture in the future.
Various ideas have been proposed to address the issues surrounding population growth and the best, most environmentally-friendly ways to feed the world. One of the most promising solutions to an overpopulated world facing starvation may actually be found in the middle of the urban areas.
Vertical Farming is a component of urban agriculture — imagine a skyscraper stacked with floors of produce in the middle of an urban area. Vertical farming is the practice of producing food in vertically stacked layers, in vertically inclined surfaces, and/or integrated in other structures. By the year 2050, roughly 80 percent of the world is expected to live in urban areas. Vertical farming could remove the need for soil and sunlight, meaning the expansion of land for agriculture wouldn’t be necessary and the amount of water used to produce crops would drop significantly. While this is one proposed idea among many, it raises the question: what will become of our farmers in rural areas?
