Sustainable Production of Nutrition-Dense Crops

Feeding nutrition-dense food to future world populations presents agriculture with enormous challenges as projections indicate that crop production will need to nearly double to meet future human needs, all else being unchanged (i.e. food waste levels, current trends in population and consumption). However, crop production cannot be increased to meet this challenge simply by increasing land acreage or using past agricultural intensification methods. Previously, food production increased through substantial use of synthetic fertilizer, pesticides, and irrigation, all at significant environmental cost. Future production of nutrition-dense food will require sustainable, next-generation crop production systems, with decreased use of synthetic fertilizer and pesticides. Next generation crop production systems could rely both on precision agriculture, and on biologically based technologies for increased soil fertility, pathogen and pest control, and control of soil erosion (e.g. cover cropping, intercropping, etc.). New crop germplasm with enhanced nutritional content, enhanced tolerance to abiotic and/or biotic stresses, will also need to be developed, whether through traditional breeding or enhanced with use of biotechnology, including genetic engineering tools. Finally, crop production strategies will need to be different in different regions of the world.

The aim of this Research Topic is to solicit scholarly and scientific contributions from experts who can provide accurate information about what is known and not known in research areas of crop production for human nutrition and next-generation cropping systems for technologically advanced and less technologically advanced regions of the world. We also welcome contributions regarding the challenges of developing new crop germplasm with enhanced nutritional content and enhanced tolerance to abiotic and/or biotic stress.