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Glossary

The Green Revolution

The «Green Revolution» is commonly understood to mean the introduction of new technologies in agriculture and their spread in developing countries. This modernization of cultivation methods began in Asia in particular in the 1960s, but also extended to Latin America.

The Green Revolution is primarily associated with the development of modern high-performance varieties of wheat and rice; this work is mainly carried out at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico and at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI, International Rice Research Institute) in the Philippines. In addition to the introduction of new varieties, the Green Revolution also includes an expansion of irrigation and the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.

Thanks to the Green Revolution, global food production has tripled in recent decades - outpacing population growth. Without high-yielding varieties, food production in developing countries would today be a quarter lower than it actually is, and there would be some 200 million more hungry people worldwide. The Green Revolution thus helped avert the famines that contemporaries still considered inevitable in its early days, and it has made a considerable overall contribution to global food security.

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