Royal Society of New Zealand Talk Series: A New Way of Using Our Land

Royal Society of New Zealand Talk Series: Facing the Future

(see http://www.rsnzwaikato.org/talkseries)

Free, all welcome

7.30 pm, Tuesday 6 December 2011

Waikato University, Room S.G.01 – entry via either Gate 1 on Knighton Road or Gate 8 on Hillcrest Road, Hamilton

"A New Way of Using Our Land"

by bio-engineer Dr Rod McDonald, NZ Institute for Plant & Food Research, Ruakura)

Could we use our land in a radically different way? A way that would help us meet the challenges and opportunities in world population growth, resource depletion, climate change, food shortages and crop and animal disease threats?

Our temperate climate supports production of large quantities of protein-rich leafy plant material, most of which goes into maintaining the animals we use to convert it to milk and meat. This system has worked well for us, but it generates problems, and it is inefficient in terms of food production per hectare. With world food production under increasing strain, that inefficiency may justify looking at another approach.