Dear colleagues,

Biology Thursday seminar continues on 20th Feb, 12:15, room AT122

with Dr. Andrew MacDougall, Guelph University, Canada, on:

"Using fundamental ecological principles to redesign the global food system for greater environmental sustainability"

Short summary: Feeding a growing world population, while minimizing negative environmental impacts, is a global challenge. Global food productivity has risen 123% since 1970, with food production now covering 1/3 of the earth's terrestrial surface. At the same time, farm intensification is associated with widespread environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and polluted drinking water, with costs estimated in the billions annually. Given that global food demand is projected to be at least 50% greater by 2050, it is critical that agricultural systems increase production in ways that are more environmentally sustainable. This talk focuses on a key source of environmental impact with farming - input inefficiency - and examines how basic principles of consumer-resource dynamics, stoichiometric co-limitation, plant-resource feedbacks, and other core ecological principles can readily apply, with surprising relevancy, to redesigning farm management to increase efficiency that, in turn, help mitigate factors such as pest outbreaks and loss of GHG and nutrients.

More on his research at: http://www.macdougallecology.ca/

Host: Risto Virtanen

See you there!

Heikki

=============================================== Heikki Helanterä Associate Professor (tenure track) Ekologian ja genetiikan tutkimusyksikkö / Ecology and Genetics Research Unit Oulun Yliopisto / University of Oulu / Finland heikki.helantera@oulu.fimailto:heikki.helantera@oulu.fi +358-50-4700545