By Cynthia Rosenzweig and Manuel Otero

WE are experiencing a time of significant upheaval, with far-reaching effects on agriculture, food production, and people.
However, this is not a new challenge—since the dawn of humanity, concerns about food availability and access have persisted, with famines resulting from natural disasters and human-made crises, such as wars.
Malthusian concerns about food production failing to keep pace with population growth have resurfaced time and time again. As recently as the 1960s, some predicted the inevitability of widespread famines.
However, since then, although the global population has grown from about three billion to more than eight billion people, the world now produces 30% more protein and calories per capita with relatively modest increases in agricultural land (less than 9% since the 1960s). Meanwhile, inflation-adjusted commodity prices are lower than they were in the 1970s.

A key reason for these achievements has been what an influential 2001 study called the “slow magic” of science and technology applied to agri-food production.
Persistent investment in agricultural research led to the Green Revolution and a significant increase in food availability, with positive effects on nutrition, economic productivity, social stability, and peace.
The Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) has been an inseparable part of these efforts. Created in 1942, based on ideas presented at the First Agricultural Conference of the Americas in 1930 and resolutions from the Eighth Scientific Congress of the Americas in 1940, IICA has since focused on supporting and spreading advances in agricultural science and technology.

In the 1960s, the key problem was generating enough calories, and the response focused on a few crops and a limited set of technologies. Energy prices were low, and climate variability was not yet perceived as an issue.
Now, we face more complex challenges, such as the need to operate within natural resource constraints and changing climate conditions.
The region of the Americas is the world’s leading net exporter of food, and plays a crucial role in the global water and oxygen cycles and as a carbon sink, making our countries anchors of global food security and environmental sustainability. Integrating both functions requires a deep understanding of the vital planetary processes that sustain life.

This is where AgMIP comes in. Founded in 2010, the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP) is a global research initiative that enhances the modeling of agricultural and food systems to optimise predictions, inform policies, and support resilient agriculture and resource management.
Current nutrition and resilience challenges demand diversified agricultural production and diets, in the context of higher energy prices and greater concerns about natural resources and biodiversity.
Therefore, the multiple scientific technologies and innovations that are necessary must be tailored to a variety of ecosystems. The good news is that science is proving to have the information, ideas, and methodologies to offer alternative pathways to address these challenges.
Our organizations have complementary strengths to carry out this work. As a multinational governmental organization, IICA has over 80 years of political and technical support experience across all the countries of the Americas, engaging with governments, farmers, universities, and the people of the continent.

AgMIP, for its part, has developed widely used tools and protocols to conduct harmonized analyses of agricultural systems using the best available models. It has also advanced new methods to integrate stakeholder-informed scenarios into global and regional assessments of current and future agricultural and food system outlooks, considering climate change and other impacts.

Both organizations have partnered to develop the best scientific and technological solutions to the challenges facing food and agricultural production.
Today’s challenges require greater efforts in human and financial resources than what allowed the planet to achieve current levels of food security. And since “the magic of science and technology” works slowly, we must concertedly increase the necessary investments in agricultural research.
Greater support will help develop a new narrative about the crucial role agriculture plays in the functioning of human society and the planet.
By working together, our organizations can help develop the technological and policy solutions needed to address the challenge of feeding a growing population with healthy diets, within climate and ecosystem constraints, while generating income and employment, especially for those who need it most.