This is the old United Nations University website. Visit the new site at http://unu.edu

Interfaces: present and future

P.G. Tulpule

National Institute of Nutrition. Hyderabad. India

This workshop is a joint endeavour on the part of different national and international organizations to encourage interfaces between agriculture, nutrition, and food science. I am very happy that the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) is one of the sponsors of this workshop.

The problems involved in bridging the wide gap between the national nutrition needs of the developing countries and available food supplies can be approached by the following three lines of action, which can be taken up simultaneously: (a) increasing food production through better agricultural technology; (b) ensuring effective conservation and utilization of foods through the application of modern technology; and (c) emphasizing education in these fields, particularly the nutritional aspect.

In India, increase in crop production during the last 30 years has by and large taken place through an expansion in total as well as irrigated areas under the major food crops. Although an appreciable improvement in per hectare productivity did occur in wheat and bajra, the increase in production of other crops is largely through an expansion of the area under cultivation, or horizontal expansion, as Dr. M.S. Swaminathan has put it. Knowing the adverse consequences of this kind of horizontal expansion on agricultural growth, the emphasis has now been shifted to vertical growth in productivity by improving all aspects of agricultural management. It is essential that the fast-growing knowledge on crop and land-use planning based on principles of economics and ecology should be transmitted to the vast number of needy and illiterate farmers.

So far agricultural scientists have used farm demonstration and other pilot projects to carry this message of science to the farmers. Other methods, such as the establishment of farm science training centres and operational research projects on a whole village, are now being implemented. While the former approach imparts the latest scientific skills to illiterate farmers as a consequence of learning by doing, the latter serves to demonstrate the value of scientific management in increasing the productivity of crops and farm animals. Such operational projects also provide an opportunity for social scientists and economists to work in close collaboration with agricultural scientists.

It is heartening to see that the recent agricultural research programme under the coordinated scheme for wheat, rice, maize, sorghum, millet, oilseeds, and pulses, is receiving greater attention than it did in the past in breeding a nutritionally superior quality of produce. Promising germplasm or genetic material with desirable characteristics is being made available by international programmes to Indian national programmes for upgrading nutritionally the quality of hybrids. In these programmes the National Institute of Nutrition has played an active part.

The recent development of high-yielding varieties of cereals and of modern agronomy to suit their cultivation has provided the basis for the new strategy in agriculture. Studies on new varieties of rice, wheat, sorghum, and pearl millet that respond to fertilizer input also lay emphasis on combining high yield with desirable nutritional quality.

In addition to fostering a fruitful co-operation between plant geneticists and nutritionists that is leading to nutritionally superior varieties of cereals and millets, this interaction has led to impressive attempts towards elimination of undesirable factors in plant foods. Gossypol-free cottonseed, erucic acid-free rape seed, and low-toxin lines of Lathyrus sativus are a few instances. It has also been possible to outwit the storage fungi affecting agricultural commodities at post-harvest stages. It is recognized that the problem of aflatoxin contamination in foods in general and groundnut in particular is a health hazard in view of its hepato-toxic and carcinogenic potential. It is therefore important that measures for preventing such contamination should receive high priority. During the last few years various approaches to this end have been vigorously pursued. The methods currently under investigation are: (a) quick-drying methods after harvest and safe conditions of storage; (b) methods for the removal of toxins by physical and chemical treatment; and (c) genetic identification of varieties resistant to fungal attack or resistant to toxin elaboration. The beginning of the last approach was made at the NIN in 1967, when our investigations led to identification of varieties of groundnut that were resistant to aflatoxin elaboration. Subsequent to this, a similar approach has been pursued at several research centres, including ICRISAT, and several promising leads have been obtained.

Looking back at the achievement of the past few decades, one feels that the progress in the application of food science and agricultural development for the betterment of nutrition, though slow, has been reassuring. The single most important challenge facing us on this front is to learn why adoption of some of the improvements already made has been slow in spite of proven advantages.

In this context, a criticism that is often leveled against the current system of integration between agriculture, nutrition, and food science is that the education component has been largely neglected. It must be recognized that there is a need to impart education at various levels, and it is equally important to realize that the kind of communication media used and the content of what is to be taught to each of the target groups will be different. Unfortunately, so far sufficient emphasis has not been placed on this aspect. There is thus a great and urgent need to carry out research on education methodology and to evolve and develop appropriate material for mass communication.

The formulation and implementation of integrated education programmes require the participation of the scientists trained in various disciplines, namely, nutrition, agriculture, home science, and food technology. The services of large numbers of young and enthusiastic scientists turned out every year in these disciplines could be well utilized for this purpose. Appropriate short-term training courses need to be started at selected centres or strengthened wherever they now exist. It is also important, as stated above, that the course content of the training programmes should cater to the needs of the target population. In view of the differences in socio-economic, literacy, and intellectual status there can be no single method by which all segments of population can be effectively reached. Let us hope that the deliberations of this workshop will take note of this and suggest measures to improve the situation.

Interactions in food technology, agriculture, and nutrition

C.P. Natarajan, S.K. Majumder, and J.V. Shankar

Central Food Technological Research Institute, Mysore, India

The last 30 years have witnessed spectacular increases in food-grain production in India, from 51 million tonnes to more than 130 million tonnes. A sizeable buffer stock has also been built up to face the likely shortages arising out of uncertain production levels (table 1) (DES 1975).

TABLE 1. Food-grain Production

Source: DES 1975.

Various national projections indicate that food-grain production must be doubled to meet the needs of an estimated population of more than 950 million by the turn of this century. Since food grains constitute the principal source of calories, proteins, and other nutrients (table 2), careful efforts are necessary not only to conserve them against qualitative and quantitative losses but also to upgrade their nutritional and acceptability features. Thus, a systems approach has become crucial for integrating the production, conservation, and nutrition of food grains to get maximum benefits from national efforts.

TABLE 2 Daily Per Capita Food Consumption and Recommended Levels

a. Indian Council of Medical Research
Source: Gopalan et al 1971, Gopalan and Narasinga Rao 1971; NCST 1972.

Breeding of new food-grain varieties has been directed to increasing per hectare yields and resistance against field-borne micro-organisms and insect pests. Advances in food technology and nutrition have, however, given some insight into the desirable features that need to be considered in breeding programmes. This paper attempts to highlight some salient features of the processing, storage, and nutritive value of food grains produced in India so as to understand the interphase linkages between production and post-harvest conservation.

Research and development efforts to raise food production

The impressive growth in food-grain production during the last 30 years has resulted from increases in the area under food-grain crops (table 3); improvement of their per hectare yield (table 4); introduction of high-yielding varieties, particularly of wheat and rice; and an expansion of area under their cultivation (table 5), together with the provision of irrigation and other inputs.

TABLE 3. Total Cropped Area and Food-grain Production

Sources: DES 1975; Tata Services Ltd 1980.

TABLE 4. Yield of Important Food Grains (tonnes/hectares)

Source: DES 1978 1980.

TABLE 5. Area under High-yielding Varieties (in million hectares)

a. Target for 1978/79, 42 million hectares. Figures in parentheses indicate the area under high-yielding varieties out of total area under the respective crop.
Source: Tata Services Ltd 1980.

Despite these efforts, unstable production has been a conspicuous feature (table 3) even in identical areas devoted to food-grain cultivation. Hence, research and developmental efforts have focused on bridging the gap (UNCSTD 1978) between the proven yield potential and national yield average of food-grain crops (table 6).

TABLE 6. Gap between National Average Yields (NAY) and Yield in National Demonstrations (YND) in Farmer's Fields

Source: UNCSTD 1978.

Maximum productivity has been sought by judicious water-management practices, appropriate cropping systems (double, triple, and multiple) under dry and irrigated conditions, improved dryland agriculture (mulching, recycling of runoff water to provide supplementary irrigation, and choice of crop compatible with season), intercropping, multilevel cropping, and mixed farming practices (UNCSTD 1978).