The Future of Agriculture - Sarah Bearchell ****

Popular science topics are fairly evenly divided between those that are of pure intellectual interest, such as astronomy or relativity, and those with a direct impact on our lives - such as climate change or quantum physics. There's often a danger with the 'direct impact' that they can be a little worthy and try too hard to be deeply meaningful. For some reason this often seems to be the case with anything food related. But thankfully agriculture is a topic that is both rarely examined and has the potential for plenty of interesting science (and history thereof).

Inevitably climate change does come into the mix, both in terms of its impact on our ability to grow crops and in the greenhouse gas emissions from cow burps, fertiliser and more. To make things more complex, with a growing world population and some parts of the world chronically short of food, we need ways to grow more without impacting the climate in a negative fashion.

It's purely coincidental that I'm reviewing this book soon after covering We Are Eating the Earth, as they have, to some degree, very different approaches to similar problem areas. Both, I think, would agree on the dubious nature of biofuels (though it's not something Bearchell addresses directly), but where Michael Grunwald in We Are Eating reluctantly admits to the environmental benefits of properly managed intensive farming, Sarah Bearchall is much more likely to be supportive of concepts like regenerative agriculture.

However, Bearchell also gives us a range of useful mechanisms to think about changing the way we interact with food and farming whether it be eating bugs, reducing waste, precision plants or automated animal rearing. This is the kind of book where you don't want lengthy expositions and Bearchell packs a lot into a slim volume.

I found the viewpoint here more challenging than I did Grunwald's - while I'm convinced of the threat of climate change, I think there is no point in preaching an ideal picture. We need pragmatic solutions that work with what people will actually do and that make best use of science like genetic modification. While not coming out as explicitly anti-GM, Bearchell can feel wary about this, and occasionally, comes across as an idealist. But being challenged in your views is not a bad thing, and it's an excellent book to read alongside Grunwald's.

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