Stephen Long
Departments of Crop Science and of Plant Biology,University of Illinois, Urbana, IL, USA.
Bioenergy crop expansion has been viewed as competing for land with food crops, and therefore a potential cause starvation at a time when global demand for food is rising faster than supply. I will show that there are many opportunities to produce large quantities of bioenergy feedstock without competition with the major food crops while providing important ecosystem services and employment in depressed areas. Ecosystem services of the bioenergy crops – include soil carbon deposition, stabilization of eroding lands, and restoration of degraded soils. It will be shown that bioenergy can complement and even boost food crop production. Particular attention will be given to emerging perennial monocotyledonous species – especially those of the genera Agave, Miscanthus and Spartina. These have proved to be particularly sustainable and productive, on poor soils and provide options for low rainfall areas and salinated soils. Finally, the enhanced progress that could be made in bioenergy production through bioengineering will be reviewed through the example of another dryland feedstock, sorghum. In examining geographies, China and the USA share many of the same challenges and opportunities; closer ties in realizing these opportunities would have mutual benefit.
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