Dr. Nina Fedoroff, who has been the science and technology advisor to the US secretary of state since 2007, told the BBC One Planet programme that there are already too many people living on Planet Earth.

Cited as “one of the most influential science advisors in the US government”, dr. Fedoroff said that the emphasis should be on trying decrease the growth rate of the global population, since the planet can’t support many more people. I think it’s a very relevant question, one that people usually tend to disregard (probably due to the sensitivity of it) – considering that the size of our planet is constant and that there is a limit to the agricultural land that can be cultivated sustainably, the question of the maximal population able to survive on Planet Earth is an essential one.

She also makes a good comparison between GM foods and medicine: “We accept exactly the same technology (as GM food) in medicine, and yet in producing food we want to go back to the 19th Century”. I don’t want to start debating the merits or risks of genetically modified food, but I do believe that GM food is approached with a certain amount of unhealthy and emotional criticism, which makes the possibility of constructive debate quite impossible.

Dr Fedoroff also sttated that in her view the US sooner or later has to sign up to legally binding targets on carbon emissions.

The article can be read here: BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Earth population ‘exceeds limits’