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Eye on Asia | How Asia’s small farmers can harness technology to combat climate change and improve food security
- As climate change makes farming harder and more unpredictable, Asia’s millions of smallholder farmers need innovation and technology to tackle pests and crop diseases, to better meet the region’s growing food demand
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Looking at our mega cities and metropolises, it is easy to assume that the whole of Asia is on the up. Yet Asia’s continued progress and development still largely depends on its millions of smallholder farmers – the world’s largest – each working on land two hectares or smaller. They face a tall order, with food demand rising as the population tops four billion, even as climate change brings new challenges.
Vertical farming may help to meet demand in urban areas but smallholders, who produce more than a third of the world’s food supply, need smart innovations to improve productivity from the ground up.
In Vietnam, for example, rice farmers are at the mercy of pests such as brown planthopper, or diseases such as the rice ragged stunt virus and rice grassy stunt virus, which can wipe out entire harvests. As climate change affects the way these crop threats spread and emerge, rice farmers need more and better support to identify pests and disease, and take early action to limit their impact.
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To do this, CropLife Asia and the German development agency GIZ worked with the Vietnamese government to teach 17,000 farmers along the Mekong Delta to use crop protection products and intervene when a pest threatens their crops.
The Better Rice Initiative Asia project was so successful in helping farmers to identify and address pests and diseases before they cause major losses that incomes increased by up to 18 per cent. The project is also under way in Thailand. In both countries, the use of an integrated pest management approach helps farmers to address pests and diseases while posing minimal risks to people and the environment.
For example, by knowing exactly when and how to use pesticides, farmers can avoid contamination and preserve biodiversity and ecosystems, while using less pesticides overall. This is part of a global industry effort to equip farmers with creative and cutting-edge ways to achieve more with fewer inputs, driven by innovation across the crop protection field.
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