Saturday, March 2, 2013

Thomas Friedman, "The Scary Hidden Stressor": Israel Offers Solutions

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Scary Hidden Stressor" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/03/opinion/sunday/friedman-the-scary-hidden-stressor.html), Thomas Friedman observes the potential "interplay between climate change, food prices (particularly wheat) and politics." Friedman writes:

"Scientists like to say that, when it comes to climate change, we need to manage what is unavoidable and avoid what is unmanageable. That requires collective action globally to mitigate as much climate change as we can and the building of resilient states locally to adapt to what we can’t mitigate."

True, we can't control the weather, but we can build desalinization plants to mitigate the effects of draught. Abiotic stress tolerance to drought, soil salinity and heat can also be significantly improved in many plants, and thereby facilitate the use of semi-arable lands for agriculture.

Who is leading the world in both these fields? Answer: tiny Israel.

Now if only Israel's neighbors would take advantage of the answers being offered by Israel.

And if only Thomas Friedman would make the effort to contact me and allow me to show him Israel's advances in these areas.

But don't hold your breath.

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