One of the most persistent arguments for modern, mechanized agriculture is that it produces a lot of food per acre, leaving more land for other purposes. I’ve often wondered how solid this argument is, and when a debate broke out recently, I decided to look closer.

It started with a paper from a think tank. The Breakthrough Institute study, called Nature Unbound, argued that, by embracing technology, humanity could shrink its footprint and leave more land for “nature.” (more…)

A long stream of academic literature has established that public funding towards research and development matters for economic growth because it relates to increases in innovation, productivity and the like. In the recently published article “Public Funds and Local Biotechnology Firm Creation “ Kolympiris, Kalaitzandonakes and Miller demonstrate that increases in the level of funding for biotechnology research provided by the Federal Government are also closely related to increases in the number of biotechnology firm births in the US. (more…)