Bill Gates says the global hunger crisis is so immense that food aid alone can’t fully address it.
What’s needed, according to Gates, are innovations in farming technology to try to reverse the crisis documented in a new report from The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Gates cited a breakthrough he calls “magic seeds” — crops engineered to adapt to climate change and resist pests.
In assigning technology a preeminent role in addressing the world food crisis, Gates puts himself at odds with others who say his ideas conflict with worldwide efforts to protect the environment. They note that such seeds generally need pesticides and fossil fuel-based fertilizers to grow.
They also note that developing “magic seeds” takes years and won’t immediately deliver relief to countries now enduring widespread suffering because they rely on food imports or are experiencing historic droughts.
It’s a debate that could intensify international pressure to meet the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals ahead of a 2030 deadline. The 17 goals include ending poverty and hunger, battling climate change, providing access to clean water, working toward gender equality and reducing economic inequality.
“It’s pretty bleak relative to our hopes for 2030,” Gates, 66, said in an interview. “I’m optimistic that we can get back on track.”
Gates pointed to the war in Ukraine and the COVID-19 pandemic as the main causes for the hunger crisis.
“It’s good that people want to prevent their fellow human beings from starving when conflicts like Ukraine interrupt the food supply,” Gates writes in the new report.
But the real problem, he said, is that many food-insecure countries don’t produce enough of their own food — a problem sure to be worsened by the consequences of climate change.
“Temperature keeps going up,” Gates said. “There is no way, without innovation, to come even close to feeding Africa.”
Gates called for investment in agricultural research, highlighting corn seeds that thrive at higher temperatures and in drier conditions than other varieties. Those seeds were developed under a program of the African Agricultural Technology Foundation, to which the foundation has given $131 million since 2008.
Since then, the Gates Foundation has spent $1.5 billion on grants focused on agriculture in Africa, according to Candid, a nonprofit that researches philanthropic giving. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is, by some measures, the largest private foundation in the world, best known for its work on global health, including vaccines. It began in its current form in 2000, after Gates left his CEO position at Microsoft, the tech giant he co-founded. Forbes estimates his net worth at around $129 billion.
The foundation’s spending on agricultural development is why Gates’ view on how countries should respond to food insecurity has taken on heightened importance in a year when a record 345 million people around the world are acutely hungry. In July, the World Food Program said that tally represents an increase of 25% from before Russia invaded Ukraine in February and a 150% rise from before the pandemic began in the spring of 2020.
In Ghana, field trials for four varieties of modified seeds began in 2013. But only this past summer has one been approved for commercialization, according to Joeva Rock of the University of Cambridge.
“What would happen if those went into increasing funds to the national research centers in Ghana, to building roads, to building storage, to building silos or helping to build markets?” said Rock, who has written a book about food sovereignty in the country.
Gates acknowledges the importance of infrastructure like roads and other transportation systems.
“If you want your inputs like fertilizer to come in, if you want your output to go out, it’s just too expensive in Africa without that infrastructure,” he said, adding that building and maintaining roads is highly expensive.
Some researchers question the wisdom of pursuing the fundamental premise that Gates has embraced: increasing agricultural production through the use of modified seeds along with fertilizers and pesticides. They point to the environmental footprint of industrial agriculture, including the use of fossil fuel-based fertilizers, the degradation of soil quality and the diminishing of biodiversity.
Experts say alternatives could include agro-ecological interventions, like developing locally managed seed banks, composting systems to promote soil health and pesticide interventions that don’t rely on chemicals. Over time, those approaches can reduce the need for food aid and build more resilient farming systems, according to Rachel Bezner Kerr, a professor of global development at Cornell University.
Kerr, a lead author of the food chapter of the latest report from the International Panel on Climate Change, said that, while the panel doesn’t make recommendations, “Overall, the kind of focus on a few technologies and reliance on fossil fuel-based inputs isn’t in line with ecosystem-based adaptation” or a biodiverse future.
