In an era where malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies affect over two billion people worldwide, especially in low-income regions, biofortification presents a transformative solution for delivering nutrient-dense food. Increasing the nutrient concentration of staple crops through targeted agronomic practices can help combat hidden hunger, which disproportionately affects communities that rely on cereal staples. Biofortification, defined as the process of naturally increasing vitamins and minerals in crops through breeding or agronomic interventions, has the potential to impact public health significantly. However, for biofortification to fully impact public health, challenges like balancing crop yield with nutrient density and adopting precision agriculture must be addressed.
Why Biofortification Is Essential in Today’s Global Food Landscape
A third of the world’s population lacks critical micronutrients like iron, zinc, and vitamin A. These deficiencies impact health and development and create widespread social and economic burdens. Biofortifying staple crops such as wheat, rice, and maize offer a viable way to deliver essential nutrients via daily diets. Researchers like Dr. Sileshi highlight that decades of breeding for yield increases have led to high-yielding crops that often contain fewer essential nutrients than traditional or ancestral varieties. By focusing on biofortification, agronomy can bridge this nutrient gap, supporting improved health outcomes, particularly in regions with limited dietary diversity.
The Challenge of Balancing Yield with Nutrient Density
One of the most significant challenges in biofortification is balancing the demand for high-yield with the need for nutrient-rich food. Historically, crop breeding has focused primarily on increasing yield to meet the growing food demands, often at the expense of nutritional quality. However, breeding alone cannot solve the problem; it must be coupled with suitable agronomic practices that sustain nutrient density even in high-yield conditions.
Research has shown that increasing the nutrient density of crops like wheat and maize can impact yields due to complex genetic and environmental factors. For example, high phosphorus application rates or high levels of indigenous soil phosphorus can interfere with the uptake of zinc by crops and its availability in edible parts such as grains. As Dr. Mina Devkota, a lead researcher in the field, mentioned, adopting a fertilizer management strategy that adjusts nutrient application based on soil conditions and crop needs helps overcome nutrient antagonisms and optimize nutrient absorption. Precision agronomy tools now allow farmers to balance these factors through soil enrichment techniques and precisely tailored fertilizer applications, improving nutrient uptake while maintaining productivity.
Precision Agriculture: A Game-Changer in Biofortification
To address nutrient density at scale, precision agriculture has emerged as a powerful ally. By leveraging technologies like variable-rate fertilization, guided by soil mapping and sensor-based monitoring, agronomists can optimize nutrient applications for biofortified crops. This precision is essential in balancing nutrient requirements and maximizing biofortification outcomes. For example, variable-rate application ensures that zinc and iron levels meet target densities while avoiding excess phosphorus, which can counteract zinc uptake.
The Excellence in Agronomy (EiA) Initiative emphasizes data-driven, tailored nutrient recommendations that can enhance both nutrient density and farmer profitability by optimizing input costs. These digital tools allow agronomists to monitor crop nutrient status closely, enabling timely interventions that ultimately lead to healthier, nutrient-dense crops. This approach helps realize the full genetic potential of crops through smart agronomy.
Facilitating Farmer Adoption, Consumer Acceptance, and Shaping Market Dynamics for Biofortified Foods
For biofortification to be effective on a large scale, farmer adoption, consumer acceptance, and market support are crucial. Due to misconceptions or a lack of awareness, farmers and consumers may need more awareness of biofortified foods, which calls for comprehensive education campaigns to bridge the information gap. To foster broader acceptance, it's essential to convey the health benefits of biofortified foods, especially in communities heavily affected by micronutrient deficiencies.
Market incentives and policy interventions also play a pivotal role in promoting farmers' and consumers' adoption of biofortified crops. Dr. Sileshi emphasizes that governments can promote the uptake of biofortified crops by offering subsidies for biofortified seeds or including these varieties in staple crop initiatives. Financial incentives, such as premium pricing for biofortified foods, can further incentivize adoption, ensuring that biofortification becomes an economically viable practice for farmers and a valuable choice for consumers.
Advancing Research and Innovation in Biofortification
While biofortification has made substantial progress, several areas still require further exploration. For instance, understanding how biofortified crops retain their nutrient levels through post-harvest processing, storage, and cooking will ensure these benefits reach consumers. Additionally, integrating biofortification with sustainable agriculture practices like conservation agriculture could improve soil health and crop nutrition over the long term.
Future biofortification breakthroughs will likely come from a combination of genetic and agronomic innovations. New breeding techniques, such as gene editing, could enable the precise selection of nutrient-dense traits without compromising yield. Additionally, soil and crop management practices, such as soil and foliar applications of Zn and Fe and the use of organic fertilizers, could further enhance the nutrient density of produce. Dr. Mina Devkota believes that agronomy plays a central role in global food security, not only in feeding the world but in nourishing it with essential nutrients for better health outcomes.
Enhancing Global Health, One Crop at a Time
As the world faces increasing food security and malnutrition challenges, agronomy offers a path forward through biofortification. Biofortification can become a sustainable and impactful solution for micronutrient deficiencies through practices prioritizing soil health, precision nutrient management, and genetic innovation. By aligning agronomic practices with breeding innovations, we can unlock the potential of our food systems to nourish people and communities worldwide.
This article has been created to present the highlights from the EiA Seminar on Global Wheat Biofortification, taking place on October the 30th 2024.
The seminar presented findings from a global meta-analysis that evaluated the effects of various agronomic management practices, genetic traits, and biophysical environments on wheat yield and nutritional quality. The analysis drew from data collected from 243 scientific studies across 41 countries.
About the study.
This seminar provides results of a global meta-analysis conducted to assess responses of wheat, yield and nutritional quality, to NPK + micronutrient fertilizer application. Data collected from in-field studies involving different wheat varieties, variable soil conditions and management practices across geographies (G×E×M) is analyzed to establish overall effect size and responsiveness to agronomic biofortification. Strong global evidence has been generated on the potential of agronomic biofortification to increase farm productivity, food and nutritional security for improved consumers health, and climate resilience with reduced environmental impact. Operating within marginal production environments, smallholder farmers face significant hurdles: declining productivity, malnutrition, hunger, rising production costs, and growing vulnerability to climate-related stresses. These pressing challenges underscore the urgency for innovative solutions, which is what inspired this study. By conducting such comprehensive meta-analysis, we aim to uncover agronomic biofortification pathways that can improve smallholder farmers, food and nutritional security.
Further reading
Biofortification: A Sustainable Solution to Hidden Hunger and Malnutrition
Scaling Biofortified Crops: Role of Farmer Collectives in Combatting Hidden Hunger
Yield, Harvest, Storage of Wheat