Tag: benefits

Companies have a "good opportunity to make money" building the infrastructure needed to feed a world population growing by some 100m people a year, a top executive at oilseeds giant Bunge has said. While the need to raise crop production by 1.7bn tonnes in the first half of the century to feed the growing population had been appreciated, the problems of transporting and storing the extra had been largely ignored, Carl Hausmann said. "The infrastructure needs of the world have been underinvested in over the last several year," said Mr Hausmann, the former chief executive of Bunge in Europe and North America, now head of the agribusiness giant's corporate affairs. "But if farmers do not get more facilities to store, deliver crops, they cannot increase their production. Infrastructure is a linchpin of the entire agricultural system." Public vs private sectors Developing the transport facilities and silos needed to meet this demand looked likely to come down to private companies, given the squeezes on public sector...