ABSTRACT
This chapter will focus mainly on the application of new bioscience discoveries to crop production over the coming decades. Current applications of new genebased technologies are discussed in Chapter 3. During the next few decades, agriculture will be required to play an increasingly central role in providing renewable resources to a growing global population that could reach as much as 13 billion by 2100 (Gerland et al., 2014). In addition to providing food, agriculture is an important source of many other renewable products including textiles, building materials, medicines, lubricants, oleochemicals, livestock feed, and biofuels (Murphy, 2007a, 2010). The major priority of agriculture will always be the provision of sufficient food. However, in what is predicted to be an era of rising demand for other crop-based resources, there will be increasing competition for scarce arable land from non-food crops such as cotton, fodder/feed crops and, possibly, from some biofuel crops (Long et al., 2015).
