Brunei needs to ensure long-term food security

Diyana Ibrahim
BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN

A LONG term National Agricultural Biotechnology strategy needs to be developed to help build the country's capability and capacity in agricultural and food production to ensure prolonged food self-sufficiency.

This was highlighted by the Deputy Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources (MIPR), Hjh Hasnah Ibrahim, during the launching of the "Workshop on Application of Agri-Biotechnology in Brunei Darussalam" at the Rizqun International Hotel yesterday.

The workshop, Hjh Hasnah said, is aimed at enhancing the understanding of agricultural biotechnology and to consider its applications in ensuring a long term food security in the country. She said that "food security has become a major concern among many economies because of the sharp rise in food prices in 2007-08 and again in 2011, as well as increased food price volatility".

Emerging trends such as population growth and urbanisation, the declining performance of agriculture, natural resource constraints and climate change are also among other reasons for the rise.

"(In particular) population growth and urbanisation in developing economies have added significantly to the demand for food and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future."

She said that according to the United Nation, the world's population is expected to increase by 2.4 billion by 2050, i.e. from the current 6.9 billion to 9.3 billion.

"At the same time, the population living in urban areas is projected to gain 2.9 billion, passing from 3.4 billion in 2009 to 6.3 billion in 2050, with most growth concentrated in the cities and towns of the less developed regions."

"Asia, in particular, is projected to see its urban population increase by 1.7 billion, with China and India accounting for about a third of the total increase."

Due to the increase in economic growth and income, she said that it "will increase food demand and accelerate the diversification of diets".

"As incomes rise, diets will come to include more resource-intensive food products such as meat, dairy, eggs, fruits and vegetables; thus, unleashing a rapid increase in demand for raw agricultural commodities."

Hence, "The challenge is to provide and the world's growing population with a sustainable and secure supply of safe, nutritious and affordable high quality food." she said.

"Food will need to be produced and supplied from less land and lower inputs due to the context of global climate change, other environmental changes and declining resources," she clarified.

"Thus, food security is one of the MIPR's most important clusters and strategic initiatives," she said.

"Through the Department of Agriculture and Agrifood, it has set targets to achieve respectable self-sufficiency level in the production of agricultural commodities and agrifood production, while maintaining the capacity to import from the world market as needed."

"One of the ways is to use the advances in science and technology to increase agricultural production through the application of biotechnology," she said.

The three-day workshop is also aimed at providing experience in developing an early-stage business case for investment in a biotechnology R&D (research and development project) to its participants among other topics.

Dipetik dari - The Brunei Times