Science and Food Today and Tomorrow (1961) / Chapter Skim
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Contributions of Science to Supplying Food for a Changing World--Solutions to Problems from the Chemical Industry Standpoint
Contributions of Science to Supplying Food for a Changing World--Solutions to Problems from the Chemical Industry Standpoint
Pages 9-18
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From page 9... ...
It may be accepted as self-evident that enormous strides have been made in the past half-century in this country's methods of producing and distributing foodstuffs. Thereby we have been able to almost double our yield per acre, with about one-fifth of the manpower per unit produced; we have increased the variety and improved the quality of foods available; we have largely rebuilt the distribution mechanism in such a way as to lower cost, reduce spoilage, improve variety, and decrease risks to the consumer.
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From page 10... ...
The whole spectrum of synthetic organic compounds was just being unfolded in university laboratories and their commercial applications being tentatively explored. The first, and possibly still the most important, contribution of the chemical industry has been the availability of low-cost soil nutrients, principally nitrogen.
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From page 11... ...
The higher yields of many of our crops, our ability to avoid the waste of "farmed-out" land, and perhaps even some of our farm crop surplus problems are due in large part to developments of the chemical industry and its agricultural cooperators in this area. As the output of his land increased, the farmer has had more economic justification for expenditures for the control of predatory insects, diseases, and competing weeds.
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From page 12... ...
The chemical industry has also participated in the radical improvements which have been made in food distribution through improved packaging materials. By tailoring transparent protective films to the unique requirements of each foodstuff, such developments as the prepackaging of meat and poultry have been made possible.
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From page 13... ...
Third has been a healthy and growing chemical industry which was able and willing to devote large expenditures to research and to proceed with plant and capital expenditures when success was far from assured. Fourth, and most basic, was an economic system and government climate which promised rewards to the inventor and innovator and allowed him a maximum degree of freedom to explore the new, with due, but not excessive, regard for the risks involved, both to himself and to the users.
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From page 14... ...
Or they might be aimed to inhibit undesirable forms of life, such as harmful bacteria and viruses, fungi, or predatory insects. Understanding of biochemical activity in living cells would help also to overcome some of our major problems in establishing safe levels of human exposure to synthesized chemicals.
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From page 15... ...
It is basic to all our fundamental studies. We have to identify and measure the various synthetic and natural compounds in controlled or uncontrolled biochemical reactions in order to know the chemical situation we are working in.
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From page 16... ...
If it can be assumed -- and I see no reason to assume otherwise -- that recent legislative trends faithfully reflect public attitudes, it would appear that the basic problem before the chemical, food, and agricultural industries is to convince the public that governmental controls and administration should not be concerned solely with the elimination of risk, but rather with a judgment of risk versus gain. To do this is no mean task, but it will not 16
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From page 17... ...
And this introduces the second dilemma which the chemical industry faces -- the increased difficulty of justifying research in view of added burdens of "fool-proof testing for safety. I do not subscribe to the thesis that has been propounded that industrially 17
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From page 18... ...
To a considerable degree every research project is competing with every other one; as we add to the cost of doing the research, and subtract from the potential earning capacity of the resultant development, we make this research effort less attractive relative to the others. Decline in order of attractiveness it must, and some may well drop off the bottom of the list and join in the forgotten limbo the other good ideas we would like to develop, but won't.
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