Fungal Attacks Threaten Global Food Supply, Say Experts 76
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Fast-rising fungal attacks on the world's most important crops threaten the planet's future food supply, scientists have said, warning that failing to tackle fungal pathogens could lead to a "global health catastrophe." Fungi are already by far the biggest destroyer of crops. They are highly resilient, travel long distances on the wind and can feast on large fields of a single crop. They are also extremely adaptable and many have developed resistance to common fungicides. The impact of fungal disease is expected to worsen, the researchers say, as the climate crisis results in temperatures rising and fungal infections moving steadily polewards. Since the 1990s, fungal pathogens have been moving to higher latitudes at a rate of about 7km a year. Wheat stem rust infections, normally found in the tropics, have already been reported in England and Ireland. Higher temperatures also drive the emergence of new variants of the fungal pathogens, while more extreme storms can spread their spores further afield, the scientists say.
The scientists said there was also a risk that global heating would increase the heat tolerance of fungi, raising the possibility of them hopping hosts to infect warm-blooded animals and humans. The warning, issued in an article in the scientific journal Nature, said growers already lost between 10% and 23% of their crops to fungal disease. Across the five most important crops -- rice, wheat, maize, soya beans and potatoes -- infections cause annual losses that could feed hundreds of millions of people. Fungi made up the top six in a recent list of pests and pathogens with the biggest impact. Fungi are incredibly resilient, the researchers say, remaining viable in soil for up to 40 years, and their airborne spores can travel between continents.
Fungicides are widely used but the pathogens are well equipped to rapidly evolve resistance to treatments that target only a single cellular process. Existing fungicides and conventional breeding for disease resistance are no longer enough, the researchers say. One solution is planting seed mixtures that carry a range of genes that are resistant to fungal infection, rather than monocultures of a single strain. In 2022, about a quarter of wheat in Denmark was grown in this way. Technology may also help, the scientists say, with drones and artificial intelligence allowing earlier detection and control of outbreaks. New pesticides are being developed, with a team at the University of Exeter recently discovering compounds that could lead to chemicals that target several biological processes within the fungi, making resistance much harder to develop. The approach has already been shown to be useful against fungi infecting wheat, rice, corn and bananas. "While that storyline is science fiction, we are warning that we could see a global health catastrophe caused by the rapid global spread of fungal infections," said Sarah Gurr, professor at the University of Exeter and co-author of the report. "The imminent threat here is not about zombies, but about global starvation."
The scientists said there was also a risk that global heating would increase the heat tolerance of fungi, raising the possibility of them hopping hosts to infect warm-blooded animals and humans. The warning, issued in an article in the scientific journal Nature, said growers already lost between 10% and 23% of their crops to fungal disease. Across the five most important crops -- rice, wheat, maize, soya beans and potatoes -- infections cause annual losses that could feed hundreds of millions of people. Fungi made up the top six in a recent list of pests and pathogens with the biggest impact. Fungi are incredibly resilient, the researchers say, remaining viable in soil for up to 40 years, and their airborne spores can travel between continents.
Fungicides are widely used but the pathogens are well equipped to rapidly evolve resistance to treatments that target only a single cellular process. Existing fungicides and conventional breeding for disease resistance are no longer enough, the researchers say. One solution is planting seed mixtures that carry a range of genes that are resistant to fungal infection, rather than monocultures of a single strain. In 2022, about a quarter of wheat in Denmark was grown in this way. Technology may also help, the scientists say, with drones and artificial intelligence allowing earlier detection and control of outbreaks. New pesticides are being developed, with a team at the University of Exeter recently discovering compounds that could lead to chemicals that target several biological processes within the fungi, making resistance much harder to develop. The approach has already been shown to be useful against fungi infecting wheat, rice, corn and bananas. "While that storyline is science fiction, we are warning that we could see a global health catastrophe caused by the rapid global spread of fungal infections," said Sarah Gurr, professor at the University of Exeter and co-author of the report. "The imminent threat here is not about zombies, but about global starvation."
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If you ask Sri Lanka and Denmark the greatest threat to our food supply is politicians meddling in fertilizer use.
Sri Lanka aims for food security after ill-fated fertilizer ban
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotli... [nikkei.com]
Sri Lanka’s organic farming disaster, explained
https://www.vox.com/future-per... [vox.com]
Fertiliser ban decimates Sri Lankan crops as government popularity ebbs
https://www.reuters.com/market... [reuters.com]
EU to deal new blow to Dutch farmers by tightening fertilizer rules; Nitrogen protests continue
https://nltimes.n [nltimes.nl]
Re:Well, finally (Score:5, Informative)
If you ask Sri Lanka and Denmark ... EU to deal new blow to Dutch farmers
Just a heads up that the Dutch live in the Netherlands, sometimes referred to as Holland. The people living in Denmark are called Danish. And your links are about Sri Lankans and Dutch farmers, not Danish.
Re:Well, finally (Score:5, Funny)
I went voting in the local election this morning, first time having to show photo ID thanks to new law, and was immediately identified as "Dutch" by the election assistant. I couldn't figure out why at first, but then I saw it says "Deutschland" right on the front of my passport: near enough aparrently.
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Obligatory Austin Powers quote:
"There are only two things I can't stand in this world: People who are intolerant of other people's cultures, and the Dutch."
Re:Well, finally (Score:4, Informative)
WTF have Dutch farmers have to do with Denmark? Geez, the trend of ignorant comments getting modded "informative" is really disheartening.
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There’s no singular cause for the crisis, which had been building for years due to political corruption and right-wing authoritarian politics that weakened democracy.
All systems, including food systems, are weakened when corrupt politicians siphon money and energy from the system at every turn.
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We gotta keep the beer flowing!!
(Ok, I just recently got back into all grain brewing...)
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That's a really stupid line. EVERYBODY has been ignoring the warning, not just the right wing. And when that's the case, blaming it on authoritarianism and corruption is "throwing a dead cat on the table".
People tend to be short-sighted. People tend to avoid thinking about problems they don't know how to solve. They tend to address that kind of thing by "hoping for the best".
The only clear answer to this problem is to actually deal with climate change, i.e. global warming, but just about nobody really w
Re:Well, finally (Score:4, Informative)
Yup, we're fucked.
We had the last 50 years to develop things like nuclear, which has a lot less risks and impacts than climate change. And we didn't do shit. We are in damage-control mode now. Deploying more nuclear, and even renewables (or any low CO2-emissions power source), will help in the long run, so we should definitely still focus on those. But the damage is already done.
Remember that with the inertia of CO2 in the atmosphere, any action we take now will not have a noticeable effect on temperature for the next 20 years. Meaning that the next 20 years are basically already written. You can see that in the latest IPCC report for instance (or this figure taken from it for instance [www.ipcc.ch]), but it has been known for the last 3-4 reports already.
What I don't get though, is people who are either pro-nuclear only, or pro-renewables only. As if we had the time and luxury to be picky.
Also, this delay between action taken/visible result is why it is hard for politicians to actually do something about this problem: most meaningful actions they can take would make them more unpopular, and less likely to be reelected. Why burn their political capital, so that someone else (maybe from a different political party) can reap the benefits from it decades later? And no, I don't believe they could be driven by self-preservation, because most of them believe (maybe rightfully) that their power will allow them to ignore climate change. At least more than the rest of us.
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What I don't get though, is people who are either pro-nuclear only, or pro-renewables only. As if we had the time and luxury to be picky.
It's because nuclear [nikkei.com] doesn't help [cleantechnica.com]. It's too slow, and it takes away funding needed for superior solutions. If you don't get that, then congratulations! You have a shitload of company, especially around here.
The fact we're still arguing about this instead of spending every energy dollar on viable, fast, superior solutions is why we're doomed. The only people spending money on nuclear power benefits are those who build it and the generation companies, whose profits are capped (because of repeated abuse) and w
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Nuclear would have helped a lot if we'd invested in it 30 - 40 years ago. Now its much better to focus on solar and wind. You get a much quicker payoff, there's less resistance, etc. (And 30 - 40 years ago solar and wind wasn't a viable option, because the tech wasn't ready.)
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Nuclear would have helped a lot if we'd invested in it 30 - 40 years ago. Now its much better to focus on solar and wind.
The good news is that there is a country in the world which already did the math, and have hands-on experience with both renewables and nuclear. It is called China (whether you like their political system or not is irrelevant).
They are leading the way in renewables deployment, with more renewables deployed in 2022 than the rest of the world combined. While at the same time providing most of the solar panels needed by the rest of the world, and stuffs like those nice magnets needed by wind turbines. The conc
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It's because nuclear [nikkei.com] doesn't help [cleantechnica.com].
The two links you provided are from sources biased towards renewables energies... Whereas the IPCC and other scientists (unbiased sources) says:
a) that it would have helped A LOT to not oppose it in the last 40-50 years (meaning that if you were part of those opposing it, you have a strong responsibility in the problem we now face, and the consequences of it, like loss of biodiversity, loss of lives, damages to properties, etc...)
b) that even though it won't help for the next 5-10 years (depending if you lo
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The situation in the Netherlands is slightly more complex than that.
The EU has set limits to nitrogen emissions (both NOx and the nitrogen compounds found in e.g. fertilizer). These limits have been in place for a long time. The first limits on NOx emissions for cars date from the 1980s, for example.
For some reason, the Durch government has postponed dealing with this issue on a number of fronts including agriculture. Some measures were taken (fertilizer is now injected into the soil instead of being spraye
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The Canadian Fertilizer Ban
Here is a response from an actual farmer. I found it quite insightful https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
> nitrogen emissions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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While all mushrooms are fungi, not all fungi are mushrooms.
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Sure, but could we come up with a both dominant and edible fungus?
Might not be tasty, but people do eat tofu.
need to have DDT come back? (Score:1)
need to have DDT come back?
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You want an insecticide to do what to fungus?
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Kill all the ants before they become zombies?
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=zomb... [duckduckgo.com]
So... (Score:1)
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What part of "Existing fungicides and conventional breeding for disease resistance are no longer enough" did you not understand?
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Damn Clickers (Score:2)
A problem for the century (Score:3)
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You're quite wrong. This may happen if the environment changes so that it improves the conditions or growth of the fungi, and creates problems for the other crops, and the "monocropness" and the "seed IP" don't really matter.
An obvious example from my backyards in Italy and Greece: birch and pine trees all over Southern Europe are dying out (or have died out) because of the repeating heat waves that make the trees ill and, and there is absolutely no "mono crop" or "strict IP controls" on their seed use.
Fung
Re: A problem for the century (Score:2)
Extremists suck. You're both wrong and right. It turns out it's both but personal I blame monoculture more because the way fungi are adapting is via natural selection but monoculture effectively hampers natural selection which is what the op said.
Either way, "this is the only truth" people are really the ones destroying the world because adaptation creates a diversity of true "fits" given environmental conditions. Humanity has for two long proposed one size fits all and thus follows reasoning via "singular
Re: A problem for the century (Score:5, Insightful)
Extremists suck. You're both wrong and right. It turns out it's both but personal I blame monoculture more because the way fungi are adapting is via natural selection but monoculture effectively hampers natural selection which is what the op said.
Monocultures make it more dangerous when a blight happens, but they don't make a blight more likely. What makes a blight more likely is the destruction of everything else that would naturally outcompete the fungi. That means, among other things:
These are the big risk factors you're looking for — that plus changing temperatures and changing amounts of moisture because of climate shifts — not the monoculture itself. The monoculture is just a secondary side effect of farmers selecting seeds that are tolerant of glyphosate. The glyphosate itself is one of the root causes.
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There are two big and relevant problems with monocrops.
One is that you can lose whole crops to a pest or infestation.
The other is that monocrops breed pests and infestations. When they get taken over by a fungus, that means a whole big-ass field producing more fungal spores. Or it means a population explosion of birds, or bugs, or whatever is eating it. Maybe both, and birds in particular are great at spreading fungi, with all that surface area.
Monocultural growing doesn't hamper natural selection, it affec
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You should check your data, or at least provide your sources so that others can check it for you...
The reality is that between 2001 and 2021, Canada lost 11% of its tree cover [globalforestwatch.org].
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Wow...you must have some weak strains of those trees there.
I live in the Deep South of the US...and we always have had pretty extreme heat and we don't have any heat related problems killing our trees, especially the pine trees.
Maybe we need to transplant some of ours over there to help out?
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No. That's true of various specific examples, but it's not true in general. Fungus is rather versitile, and many of them are quite destructive. Of course, that's their job. They're the ones that degrade the fallen forest litter.
OTOH, many individual species of fungus are in decline. Lots of varieties of mushroom aren't as common as they were.
A problem with fungus is that they're a lot more similar biochemically to us than microbes or viruses are, so we have a lot fewer things to kill them off that don'
What should we do about it? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yet another article about how global warming from burning fossil fuels is going to kill us all. What should we do about it? If the answer doesn't include using nuclear fission for energy then we must still be in a state where nuclear power is a greater threat to human civilization than global warming, and I don't see a whole lot of potential harm from nuclear power. If the politicians start to panic about global warming to the point that they actually read the studies they funded on how to address CO2 emissions, the studies that tell them nuclear power is vital to lowering CO2 emissions, then I'll start to worry about global warming.
If there's a threat of mass starvation from crop failures then perhaps we should inform the politicians that banning nitrogen fertilizers is a bad idea. If a fungus destroys crops in a wide enough area to impact global food supplies then other areas are going to have to make up for that loss somehow.
Is global warming a problem? I don't know. All I know is that politicians all over the world don't seem convinced. They have as much motivation for self preservation as anyone, so if they see global warming as something that will leave their grandchildren living in world full of disease and starvation then they'd act on it with greater urgency. It they fear nuclear power more than global warming then I see no reason to be all that concerned. We have government funded studies from all over the world telling our elected officials what needs to be done to lower CO2 emissions, studies that "follow the science". What does "the science" tell us we need to do to lower CO2 emissions? "The science" tells us we need nuclear power.
I can certainly see how mono-cultures of crops can create a threat of fungal infections, and we should do something about that. If global warming is increasing the risk of crop failures then we should do something about that too. One big thing we can do about global warming is increase the use of nuclear power, but that's something politicians all over the world are not willing to do. That tells me that they fear nuclear power more than global warming. If nuclear power is a greater threat then I'm not going to be all that concerned about global warming.
Re:What should we do about it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Just a quick tip: by the time politicians get worried, something bad has already happened.
It's basically always the case similar to this: new technology comes along, it gets deployed, turns out bad things can happen too and happen in real life... only after the fact will politicians do something.
climate change is all about taking the right steps now or in the past to do what needs to prevent bad things in the future.
See how that doesn't align with politics ?
On the topic of fungi specifically, I would like to see a lot more vertical farming, hydroponics, aquaponics, etc. which on average are less susceptible to such things and also less depends on weather in general.
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Just a quick tip: by the time politicians get worried, something bad has already happened.
Agreed. It seems to me that the issue is global warming has already done bad things, and that things will only get worse until something is done. Politicians are like anyone else in that they must put priorities on what must be done. So long as they prioritize closing nuclear power plants over lowering CO2 emissions then it appears that lowering CO2 emissions is not all that important.
It's basically always the case similar to this: new technology comes along, it gets deployed, turns out bad things can happen too and happen in real life... only after the fact will politicians do something.
I agree that every technology has pros and cons. What seems to be the case with global warming alarmists is that they do
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On the topic of fungi specifically, I would like to see a lot more vertical farming, hydroponics, aquaponics, etc. which on average are less susceptible to such things
Are they? IME you just get more of different fungi, and you will still see the same fungi as well. Unless perhaps you're going full clean room, but the food industry is terrible at that.
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Ok, I had to look it up.
That's 149F for the rest of us here in the US.
Err...that's pretty extreme, I don't see that happening anytime in the near future.
And if it did....sounds like another good reason NOT to live in a heavily urban center!!
Get away from all that concrete...
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Fixing global warming means stopping economical growth, that's why politicians don't take it too seriously.
Fixing global warming does not require stopping economic growth. We can cut our CO2 emissions by 1/3rd almost overnight by adopting nuclear fission, hydro, onshore wind, and other technologies for electricity production. Nuclear fission is a vital part of that solution but there's a longstanding political opposition to nuclear fission as an energy source because of an association with nuclear fission as a weapon. It would be far more logical to associate nuclear power with nuclear medicine because so muc
Climate bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
My climate bullshit alarm is going off. I can believe that the massive amount of fungicide and other chemical measures that food production requires has an effect on acquired resistance.
However, a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade causing widespread fungal mutations that threaten the food supply? As a mutation driver that threatens the food supply? Give me a break.
I am not denying global warming, but this is clearly a case of otherwise decent science using climate change for self serving reasons.
This is like saying that global warming is causing you to die faster from sucking on the exhaust of your vehicle.
Re:Climate bullshit (Score:4, Informative)
Global warming changes weather patterns. Places that were ideal for crops become less ideal. The crops that are stressed by less ideal conditions are more vulnerable to fungal infections. Fungal infections spread more widely.
Like any spread of infection, the number of mutations rises with the number of infected hosts and the more mutations that happen, the more likely it will be for one to make the fungus hardier.
It's not a hard concept to grasp.
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However, a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade causing widespread fungal mutations that threaten the food supply? As a mutation driver that threatens the food supply? Give me a break.
Are you a biologist?
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However, a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade causing widespread fungal mutations that threaten the food supply? As a mutation driver that threatens the food supply? Give me a break.
I don't see at all why you don't find this credible, it completely meshes with our understanding of how things work. The current range of plants, insects, fungi, algae, and frankly pretty much everything is partially defined by regional temperatures at which they can or cannot function, survive or thrive, etc. A couple degrees' shift in average is accompanied by a handful of degrees of shift in maximum and/or minimum, and it's the extremes that kill things off and prevent them from spreading into a particul
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Everything changes all the time. The effects of changes are hard to predict. The reason for changes are hard to determine.
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Everything changes all the time.
Technically? Sure. In terms of what we're talking about? No, we've had remarkable stasis for millennia, with only brief perturbations from the norm.
The effects of changes are hard to predict.
The specific effects, yes, they are hard to predict. The general effects, not so much. Greater extremes are a predicted effect of AGW.
The reason for changes are hard to determine.
The exact reasons, yes. But the total energy in the system can be calculated with only reasonable margins of error, and we can look back at our detailed records of what happened and make reasonable estimations of why and how somet
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My climate bullshit alarm is going off. I can believe that the massive amount of fungicide and other chemical measures that food production requires has an effect on acquired resistance.
However, a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade causing widespread fungal mutations that threaten the food supply? As a mutation driver that threatens the food supply? Give me a break.
Mutation rate scales non-linearly with temperature, so you'd expect significant changes during departures from what were previous regional norms. See https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.10... [pnas.org]
I am not denying global warming, but this is clearly a case of otherwise decent science using climate change for self serving reasons.
So rejected because the statement doesn't pass a quick, emotional test of reasonability. However the science doesn't have to make immediate sense to you to be correct.
You also seem to have been led to believe that there must be some big profit-making conspiracy behind it all...
This is like saying that global warming is causing you to die faster from sucking on the exhaust of your vehicle.
I've no idea where that came from.
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a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade
Averages are only a small part of the picture. There are also larger oscillations in temperature and a whole lot more volatility in the weather. It may average to within a very close range in degrees, but the effects are large and visible.
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However, a net global temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree centigrade causing widespread fungal mutations that threaten the food supply?
Fungi do not typically grow in Antarctica. Fungi spread very quickly in the tropics. The planet is warming. What does this imply for fungi and the planet?
Your skepticism and bullshit meter absolutely should be high when discussing this topic as many people want to use it as leverage; however, don't let your logic go out the window when debunking shit. You will miss some very important details.
This is so common now (Score:1)
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They never say exactly what will be His provender.
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You answered your own question there without realizing it. When something is common, we talk about it a lot. Lots more climate events means lots more discussions. If we weren't having more fires, more floods, more heat waves, less precipitation, less biodiversity, etc then we wouldn't have to talk about it. But we do. So we are.
If your family member was vomiting in the bathroom ALL THE TIME, wouldn't you talk about it a lot too?
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Don't these "scientists" have anything better to do than to keep scaring us with "the world is going to end, the world is going to end"?
No. They literally don't. If you don't heed them, the world as you know it is going to end. It's probably too late already, so there's no possible better time still available to respond than now.
Doomed. Dommed! (Score:2)
We are doomed! The end is nigh! Get religion today!
Fun Fact (Score:1)
Fungi are niether plants nor animals.
Although they may seem more like plants, they are actually a very very early branch from the animal kingdom...