Agriculture: an activity on the move

Producing food, fiber and energy to meet the needs of the population is one of the challenges of agriculture. Logically, this production needs to be sustainable from an economic, social and environmental point of view. If one of the three pillars of sustainability is not met, the activity is not effectively sustainable. For this reason, the challenge for those who are directly or indirectly involved with agricultural production anywhere in the world is increasing. In a tropical environment, such as Brazil, this challenge is even greater. Weeds, fungi, viruses and bacteria that attack cultivated plants find optimal conditions to grow and develop. Therefore, its capacity to cause economic damage is greater when compared to regions with a temperate climate.

In Brazil, over the last few years, several advances have been achieved that favor the sustainable production of food, fiber and energy. However, it is still
I need to advance both in the generation and adoption of technologies, often considered simple, but which make all the difference, such as erosion control. The lack of control over agricultural soil erosion has highly harmful consequences for society as a whole. The productive potential of agricultural soils is reduced, the conservation/maintenance of rural roads has high costs and the treatment of water for human consumption is also more expensive. 

Technologies, such as the Direct Planting System (SPD) - which consists of not disturbing the soil, soil covered with plant material and crop rotation when carried out in soils where erosion control is adequate - bring a set of advantages for growth and plant development, significantly improving production sustainability. 

Always thinking about sustainable actions in agricultural production, new knowledge, products, practices and services are made available to producers by Brazilian research. An example of this is the technology developed by Embrapa to make better use of the use of phosphorus by plants - an essential, finite nutrient, of which Brazil imports a large part of what it consumes. It is an inoculant that solubilizes the phosphorus contained in the soil for incorporation by plants.

Another excellent example of what research is capable of producing is the reduction of the dose of a certain herbicide through nanotechnology. It can often seem abstract, but it's all very close. Today there are autonomous tractors (they work without operators) and autonomous cargo vehicles (trucks) are already being launched. Inserting new technologies into production systems is imperative to reduce environmental impacts, improve the quality of what is produced, reduce costs and improve productivity.

The production of synthetic foods is also close to all of us. The production of animal protein, meat and eggs, in the laboratory, is no longer something for a distant future, but is becoming almost a reality. The technology is already mastered. Synthetic fabric is already well known and is increasingly taking up more space. With synthetic fiber (derived from petroleum), fabrics for bed, table, bath and clothing are already produced, with characteristics that are close to those produced with cotton fiber.

The advancement of biotechnology, information technologies and the development of new materials based on nanotechnology are examples of what is driving agriculture, whose predicted effects are spectacular when one thinks about automation, development of new products, improved energy efficiency, increased land and labor productivity. In summary, producing food, fiber and energy to meet the needs of the population, both from a quantitative and qualitative point of view, requires that each new knowledge be incorporated into the different plant and/or animal production systems to improve health rates. productivity and reduction of environmental impacts.

This demands, from everyone involved in agricultural production, constant improvement, so that it is possible to identify what is most suitable for each condition, with the improvement of production systems as a reference. In this way, it is necessary to always be on the move, updated, so that it is possible to incorporate into agriculture the elements that are essential to its sustainability and that, every day, are more available, thanks to advances in the frontier of knowledge.