FAO and IAEA embrace increasing role of nuclear technology in food security


On 50th anniversary, partners celebrate innovation in nuclear application for food and agriculture

02/10/2014 - 

Rome - As soil degradation, pests and livestock diseases continue to pose major threats to food security and food safety worldwide, there’s an increasing role for peaceful applications of nuclear technologies in food and agricultural development. 

This was the message conveyed by partners at an event highlighting successes of 50 years of the Joint Division of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture, a strategic partnership between the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and FAO created in 1964.

“The world may have changed since then, but the need, through technology, to provide more, better and safer food while sustaining natural resources is even greater,” said FAO Deputy-Director-General Helena Maria Semedo at an event in Rome celebrating the partnership. 

The eradication of Rinderpest in 2011 is one of the most prominent recent success stories made possible with support of nuclear technology, being only the second disease worldwide to have been fully eradicated, after smallpox.

Meanwhile, the use of  sterile male insects has become a popular alternative to the use of harmful chemicals, according to Karen Sliter, senior official of U.S. Embassy to the EU and Regional Manager for Europe, Africa and the Middle East for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’sAnimal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) in her presentation.

The technique, called Sterile Insect Technology (SIT), was pioneered by the Joint Division and relies on the release of large quantities of sterile male insects that mate with fertile females to drastically reduce the number of their offspring that pose threats to crop and livestock in a given area.  

Pest control factors prominently in the work of the Joint Division, whose Austria-based Agricultural and Biotechnology Laboratories also focus on soil and water management, plant breeding, animal production and health, as well as food and environmental protection.

Amidst rising concerns over the use of chemicals in agriculture, resource scarcity, and famine induced by crop and livestock losses, scientists of the Joint FAO/IAEA Division have been working closely with local governments and local research institutions in developing and developed countries to find need-specific solutions to local agricultural challenges.

In Kenya, which suffers from frequent crop failures, the Joint Division has been working with local experts to improve soil fertility through biological nitrogen fixation, a technique in which crops acquire nitrogen from the atmosphere, hence reducing the need for synthetic fertilizers.

 “Nuclear technologies have been applied to improve soil productivity and water use efficiency in both the crops and the livestock sectors,” according to Adipo Okoth Oyugi, Ambassador and Resident Representative of the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Kenya to the IAEA, who placed his country’s effort into a larger mission to build production systems that withstand the growing impacts of climate change.

Indonesia’s National Nuclear Energy Agency, in turn, has seen major successes in mutation breeding with the development of rice varieties that complete their cropping cycles in 100 days, allowing for three, instead of two, harvest per year.

In all, the joint division transfers a large range of nuclear technologies to member countries in the field of food and agriculture, with support of some $15 million of IAEA TC fund annually for more than 230 technical cooperation projects, according to Director Qu Liang, who emphasized the entity’s demand-driven approach.

The Joint Division has been contributing to capacity building and technology transfer for member countries in the nuclear application for agriculture. The partnership today includes a network of more than 500 research institutions and experimental stations, one of the largest collaborative agricultural research networks in the world. Each biennium some 140 member countries request and receive technical support or services, while more than 50 training courses and seminars are held annually for developing countries.

Looking at future applications of nuclear technologies, Karen Sliter underlined the ongoing need for emerging disease control, while also predicting a larger role for diagnostic techniques and irradiated vaccines.

“We’ve seen the harm that nuclear technologies can do, but there is more to be done to find out the good we can do,” she said.

 

Created 50 years ago, the Joint FAO/IAEA Division serves as a model for interagency cooperation, with the aim to broaden cooperation between member countries in the peaceful application of nuclear science and technology in building more sustainable food systems.