Study Note - The Green Revolution

Between the 1940s and 1970s there was a series of technological breakthroughs and transfers that were the result of years of research and development. Most of the initiatives that were introduced began in the late 1960s in poorer, densely-populated parts of the world.

The Green Revolution spread modern agricultural technologies around the world, changed the amount of food that could be produced, improved food security and, in some cases, turned previously-food-scarce countries into exporters of staple crops.

Technology

Modern irrigation techniques, pesticides and the cultivation of high-yielding varieties of cereal crops were the three main technological breakthroughs of the Green Revolution. The advent of diesel and electric motors led for the first time to systems that could pump groundwater out of major aquifers faster than it was recharged, which, though providing much water for irrigation, can lead to problems such as the permanent loss of aquifer capacity, worse water quality and ground subsistence.

Pesticides are chemicals that prevent, destroy or repel pests such as insects, plant pathogens, weeds, roundworms and microbes. In some cases pesticides are designed to remove molluscs, and most have been proven to have a damaging effect on other animals and humans. Despite these drawbacks, both heavy aquifer and pesticide use persist because of the benefit to food stability.

Increased Yield

Between the early 1960s and the mid 1980s the production of cereal crops more than doubled in developing countries. The introduction of a high-yield dwarf rice variety called IR-8 increased the annual production of rice in the Philippines from 3.7 to 7.7 million tonnes in two decades, making the country a rice exporter for the first time in its history.