Vincent van Ginneken, Evert de Vries
In this commentary, the discussion of the reasons for the failure of terrestrial agricultural and the argument for moving towards seaweed cultivation (and finally to a new seaweed based economy) is quite informative, regarding this interdisciplinary commentary which is a blending of a many multidisciplinary reviews, of state-of-the-art technologies and policy discussions, as well as some of our own research contributions. This is a compelling and urgent work that traces the related histories of population growth during the 20st century, the so called “Green Revolution, which was based on massive and collective input of fossil energy into processes related to terrestrial food production; so these prices are closely correlated. Central theme of this commentary is that our global primary production (green biomass) has to grow with 70% in order to provide an unfettered growing world population –estimated around 10 billion people at the midst of the 21st century- with their primary needs. Major solution of this commentary -reviewing on a global scale following the nexus: sustainable food production=> environment friendly=>health promoting-, which is a smart innovative Blue Green Technologies approach (www.bluegreentechnologies. nl). This can be accomplished by exploiting our oceans -which cover around ¾ of our globe- by culture of seaweeds the “unforeseen crop of the future” as primary producers because abundant solar energy is available at our planet. This scenario will permit humanity the 21st century a smooth transition to a green energy future avoiding global warming and ocean acidification. In addition a seaweed economy with a plethora of applications (medicine, biotechnology, energy, food etc.) can have a spin off to local economics at the remote areas of our planet where the poorest of the poorest presently life, in this way meeting the 8 Millennium Goals.
