As the world’s population grows (and grow it does) old questions continue to circle in the minds of theorists and sociologists the world over. How many people is too many? This question is approached from many different angles: will shortages of water cause international wars? Will limited access to farm loan resources favor large corporations over small substance farmers, leading to starvation? Will high yield farming save the environment, or lead to further population explosion and deforestation?
This last question is of particular interest. In the 1960s prominent biologists, comparing the human population growth to animal population change patterns determined with absolute confidence that by the 1970s and 80s the nations of India and Pakistan would experience mass starvations, possibly taking up to fifty percent of their population or more, despite any level of outside aid. The nations simply could not feed themselves and were experiencing massive population booms due to disease control at the same time.
But there was a game changer. High yield wheat and rice varieties were created and spread, allowing these nations to be self-feeding within a decade and half. Since then the population is still rising, though many parts of the world are seeing slowed growth patterns. Yet many fear that this is only a delay measure. Sooner or later the number of people needing food is bound to outpace the amount of food available (not counting the areas which are already suffering). Since no one is going to volunteer to stop eating, this question does warrant consideration, questions which biologists, geneticists, sociologists, humanitarians, leaders, and entrepreneurs are quietly challenging every day.