Plant Pandemic is Real: How a disease is threatening wheat, the world’s most important food crop
The next big pandemic could leave billions hungry. According to a study, an unprecedented spread of a fungus is threatening wheat, the most-consumed grain in the world. The blast disease is affecting production in Bangladesh and it could spread to India and China, the biggest exporters of wheat.
“Pandemic”. It’s a word that has now become a part of our everyday lexicon. COVID-19 is far from over and there has been enough speculation about the next disease that could bring the world to a standstill. Another catastrophic pandemic might already be in the making. It’s the plant pandemic.
As the name suggests, a plant pandemic strikes plants. Diseases that affect plants and crops can be devastating. Fungi are responsible for a majority of plant diseases in the agricultural world.
Like the novel coronavirus, plant diseases can also mutate fast and spread through spores, microscopic particles that are carried by wind, rain and soil.
Spores spread easily by their nature, but global trade and climate change are accelerating this process. Powerful storms and other extreme weather events bring pathogens to new regions where plants haven’t developed resistance. Modern monoculture farming only increases crops’ vulnerability to infection, according to a report in Scientific American.
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