IT SOUNDS like an environmentalist's dream. Low-tech "sustainable agriculture", shunning chemicals in favour of natural pest control and fertiliser, is pushing up crop yields on poor farms across the world, often by 70 per cent or more. But it's no dream. That's the claim being made in the biggest ever survey of green-minded farming (see p 16). The findings will make sobering reading for people convinced that only genetically modified crops can feed the planet's hungry in the 21st century.

The gains are greatest among poor farmers. This is not surprising. The high-tech green revolution that has doubled global food production in little more than a generation was always designed for big mechanised farms on the best land, using capital to buy pesticides and fertilisers the new high-yielding plant varieties need. It was never a blueprint for working the poorer land, or helping illiterate farmers with plenty of labour and ingenuity but little capital.

Yet over the past 30 years, these farmers have been pushed into half-heartedly adopting this revolution. While some have gained, this hand-me-down technology has not served them well.

The survey shows there is a better way. A new science-based revolution is gaining strength built on real research into what works best on the small farms where a billion or more of the world's hungry live and work.

For some, talk of "sustainable agriculture" sounds like a luxury the poor can ill afford. But in truth it is good science, addressing real needs and delivering real results. For too long it has been the preserve of environmentalists and a few aid charities. It is time for the major agricultural research centres and their funding agencies to join the revolution.

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