Novozymes is working together with the Danish Agriculture & Food Council and Climate Consortium Denmark to identify solutions that bring together agriculture and biotechnology to reduce the pressure on natural resources and secure future availability of food and energy, while reducing climate and environmental footprints of human activities.
“We need to find ways that ensure food and energy security. We’re running out of land to cultivate so we need to increase yield and productivity while reducing the environmental impact of production. It’s a difficult balance but we believe we can get far in these efforts with biotechnology,” says Kirsten Birkegaard Stær, Senior Specialist for Region Europe in Novozymes. “Today, modern biotechnology can offer a variety of solutions to ensure that agriculture becomes more sustainable and reduces its environmental impact.”
Biotechnology is one of the solutions
According to a WWF report, the full climate change mitigation potential of industrial biotechnology ranges between 1 billion and 2.5 billion tons CO 2-equivalents per year by 2030, compared with a scenario in which no industrial biotechnology applications are available. This is more than Germany’s total reported emissions in 1990.
“Agriculture and biotechnology are in many ways two sides of the same coin. Both take nature as their starting point and both use biological principles and processes to produce food, feed, energy, and various biomaterials in a sustainable fashion,” says Nickie Spile, Vice President, Global R&D Strategy and Projects at Novozymes. “By combining these two, we can realize the great potential to make the world more sustainable.”
Inspiring development while garnering support
As resources threaten to dwindle under the pressure of increasing demand, the climate change due to utilization of fossil fuels adds to the challenges. In cooperation with the Danish Agriculture & Food Council and Climate Consortium Denmark, Novozymes is trying to identify and build a vision for sustainable agriculture and food production with the help of biotechnology. This vision will be presented at COP15 to inspire development in the area of sustainable agriculture and garner support for the solutions suggested by Novozymes.
“The world is looking to COP15 to lead an ambitious global agreement on significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions,” says Thomas Videbæk, Executive Vice President and Head of BioBusiness at Novozymes. “But there’s no silver bullet to reduce these emissions. We believe that the use of traditional and modern biotechnology in agriculture and food production is among the key opportunities for improved sustainability and resource efficiency.”
“With a world population going toward 9 billion people in 2050, we have to get smarter about how we use our resources.”
Connie Hedegaard,
Denmark’s Minister for Climate and Energy