Before joining UNL, she was a translator for the Lincoln Public Schools and the Nebraska Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing. I will always work with the deaf community. P. Stephen Baenziger works to ensure the future of cereal breeding today. By IANR News Service Six billion people will rely on the four major cereal crops for most of their food in the 21st century. As productive land disappears to other uses, improved cereal crop varieties developed by plant breeders offer the greatest hope of feeding the world, a University of Nebraska researcher told a national scientific meeting Feb. 16.
Wheat is a major global food crop.
It's the source of the daily bread for people worldwide, and noodles made from wheat are the staple food in many Asian countries. Wheat is largely grown on marginal land, which is one of its virtues, Baenziger said. But when wheat is planted on good cropland using optimum water and fertilizer, it responds with highly productive yields. Breeding programs can maximize this production potential on both marginal and productive lands. Today, Nebraska wheat growers can feed nearly 5 million more Americans each year than they were able to on the same acreage in the 1960s.