Mineral Fertilizer Use and the Environment International Fertilizer Industry Association United Nations Environment Programme

12
Mineral Fertilizer Use and the Environment
3. The demand for mineral fertilizers
3.1.2. Income
According to the International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI, 1997), between 1993
and 2020, the global demand for cereals is
expected to increase by 41%. The developing
countries’ demand for cereals for feeding to
livestock is expected to double, while demand for
direct human consumption is expected to rise by
47%, although the largest absolute increase will
be greater for the latter. There will be similar
large increases in the demand for other crops.
Global income growth is projected to average
2.7% per year between 1993 and 2020, the
growth rate in developing countries being almost
twice that of developed countries. Economic
growth, rising incomes and urbanization,
particularly in Asia and Latin America, are
leading to rapid changes in diets, in favour of
more grain-intensive food such as meat,
particularly red meat. This leads to a substantial
increase in the demand for grain to feed
livestock, the impact on cereal requirements
being magnified by the rather low feed
conversion efficiency of livestock. IFPRI (1999)
estimates that the world's farmers will have to
produce 40% more grain in 2020, compared
with 1995. However, the expansion of the cereal
area is unlikely to be more than 5%, almost two
thirds of which will be in the difficult region of
sub-Saharan Africa. Inevitably most of the higher
production must come from higher yields per unit
area, which will require a correspondingly larger
quantity of plant nutrients, from one source or
another.
3.1. The future demand for
agricultural products
3.1.1. Population
Between today and, say, 2020, the world’s
population is going to increase, mostly in the
developing countries. According to the World
Bank’s 1994-1995 population projections, the
world’s population will increase from 5.7 billion
people in 1995 to 7 billion in 2020. This
includes increases in China from 1.2 to almost
1.5 billion, South Asia from 1.3 to 1.9 billion,
Africa from 0.7 to 1.2 billion. The rate of
increase is likely to be highest in Africa but in
view of the large population base in South Asia
and China, there will inevitably be a substantial
increase in these regions. IFPRI (1999) estimates
that developing countries will account for about
85% of the increase in the global demand for
cereals and meat between 1995 and 2020.
FAO projects that 680 million people, 12% of
the world’s population, could be chronically
under-nourished in 2010, down from 840
million in 1990-92 but still a very substantial
number. 70% of these will be in sub-Saharan
Africa and South Asia, especially Bangladesh.
In Africa and the Near East, the absolute
number of hungry people will increase, though
the proportion of the population that is
undernourished will decline. Many of these
people are the rural poor, who lack the buying
power to satisfy their nutritional needs, even
when the supplies exist. Women and children are
most affected. The issue in their case is to
develop agricultural systems which will provide
them with sustenance and income.

---

Mineral Fertilizer Use and the Environment