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The battle between humans and plant pests is as old as agriculture, but the movement of pests as a consequence of human activities has been exacerbated only recently. International research collaboration is increasingly important to tackle pests causing serious damage to economies.
Although the ‘rebound effect’ is well established in environmental economics, the sometimes paradoxical effects of yield increase are rarely questioned within the plant science community. Acknowledging the curse of efficiency can help us to reframe our societal goals from performance at all cost to resilience.
Keeping pace with food demand and climate change requires continuous genetic improvement of crops that, in turn, relies on the availability of genetic resources. Access to these resources is complicated by the need to establish benefit-sharing arrangements when accessing and using such genetic resources.
