The United States and Brazil are world leaders in agricultural research, and their collaboration over the past decades has been a cornerstone of the close relationship between the two countries. Strengthening this relationship through the expansion of collaborative research will be crucial as the world faces the existential threat of climate change and food insecurity. To tackle this challenge, scientists from the United States and Brazil are developing a research initiative on fertilizer use efficiency that will be launched during the celebration of Embrapa’s (Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation) 50th anniversary on April 26, 2023.
Until the 1970s, Brazil was a country with food insecurity that needed to import most of its food. However, in less than 30 years, Brazil transformed into an agricultural powerhouse, going from a net food importer to one of the world’s leading exporters. Today, Brazil is among the top five producers of thirty-six agricultural products. It is also the leading exporter of soybeans, corn, coffee, sugar, beef, poultry, coffee, and orange juice. The tremendous increase in the country’s agricultural production is known as the Brazilian Green Revolution and is widely regarded as one of the most significant global developments of the second half of the 20th century.
The abundant land supply in Brazil and its rich endowment of natural resources, the country’s political commitment to a modern agricultural sector, the entrepreneurial spirit of Brazilian producers, and advanced agricultural research were key elements in this transformation. Additionally, countries like Japan were important contributors in helping Brazil modernize its agriculture. For example, in the 1970s and 1980s, the Japanese-Brazilian Cooperation Program for Cerrado Development (PRODECER) developed agricultural technologies in the Cerrado savanna that helped transform the region into an agricultural powerhouse (Ekman and Macamo, 2014). Notably, the United States, through technical assistance and scientific collaboration, also played a vital role in Brazil’s agricultural development.
Today, the United States and Brazil feed about 25% of the world’s population. Without the production of these two countries, the global food supply would be critically low for a growing population. The United States and Brazil are also world leaders in agricultural research, and collaboration over the past decades has been a cornerstone of their close relationship. In the coming decades, strengthening this relationship through the expansion of collaborative research will be crucial as the world faces the existential threat of climate change and food insecurity.
Current Project
The United States and Brazil are at the forefront with an innovative research project on fertilizers. Over the past year, scientists from the United States and Brazil have been developing a research initiative on fertilizer use efficiency in response to the global fertilizer crisis. This research program highlights the vital collaboration between Embrapa, USDA’s ARS and the Foreign Agricultural Service, the University of Florida, and the International Fertilizer Development Center.
The partnership will greatly strengthen U.S.-Brazilian ties in combating climate change and food insecurity. The joint research initiative will also lead to outcomes that extend far beyond Brazil and the United States to the developing world, aiming to improve fertilizer use efficiency, which will reduce global dependence on imported fertilizers, advance global food security, and lower greenhouse gas emissions. But this research on fertilizer efficiency should be just the beginning of an expanded collaboration between the United States and Brazil as the world faces the existential threat of climate change and global food insecurity.
Source: USDA