The Mycocultural Revolution, Part I: Feeding 9 Billion
David Law
President/CEO
Gourmet Mushrooms, Inc.
The Mycocultural Revolution Series
The world population reached one billion in 1804. In just over two centuries, that number surged to seven billion by 2012, and we are on track to add another two billion people within the next 40 years. This raises an unavoidable question: how do we feed nine billion people without irreparably damaging the planet that feeds us?
In a widely cited 2009 essay for Yale Environment 360, later expanded into a 2010 TED Talk, Professor Jonathan Foley of the University of Minnesota framed this challenge with admirable clarity. He argued that one of the central environmental crises of our time is land use—specifically, how we practice agriculture.
Modern agriculture has already imposed enormous environmental costs:
Ecosystem degradation. More than 35% of the Earth’s ice-free land surface has been cleared or converted for cropland, pasture, or rangeland.
Freshwater depletion. Humanity withdraws roughly 4,000 cubic kilometers of freshwater each year, with irrigation accounting for about 70% of that total.
Widespread pollution. Industrial fertilizers have more than doubled the flows of nitrogen and phosphorus through ecosystems, degrading rivers, lakes, and coastal waters.
Greenhouse gas emissions. Land use and agriculture—including deforestation—contribute roughly 30% of global emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide.
Foley posed the core dilemma succinctly: how do we meet basic human needs at scale without destroying the biosphere in the process? His answer was not a single technological fix, but a framework. First, we must acknowledge the problem. Second, we must invest in genuinely revolutionary agricultural solutions. Third, we must bridge the artificial divide between production agriculture and environmental conservation.
He called for a global conversation bringing together commercial agriculture, conservationists, and organic farming advocates to pursue practical goals such as:
Incentives for farmers
Precision agriculture
New crop varieties
Drip irrigation
Gray water recycling
Improved tillage practices
Smarter diets
I think I have one answer to these urgent questions and it is mycoculture. Large scale, reliable mushroom cultivation has only been developed relatively recently in the previous 300 years. The cultural aspect of mushroom consumption is lagging behind plants and animals. Wild harvested mushrooms had been consumed seasonally in many cultures over time. It is still thought of as a seasonal crop even when mushrooms are now harvested year round. Mushroom cultivation answers many of the propositions, bridging the artificial divide between production agriculture and environmental conservation. I will put forth an outline of how mushroom cultivation will provide answers to these difficult questions in my next blog installment.