Wageningen University & Research (WUR) and the Photosynthesis 2.0 Research Fund (P2RF) are to establish a new independent institute for research on photosynthesis. “A key objective is to learn how we might improve the efficiency of photosynthesis in food crops. That could contribute significantly to feeding the world”, says Ernst van den Ende, a member of the WUR Board of Directors. This decision was announced today during the 104th Dies Natalis of the university.
The provisional name of the institute is the Institute for Advanced Studies for Photosynthetic Efficiency (IASPE). A total of 62 million euros will be invested in the new institute over the next decade. P2RF, which was founded by Egbert van der Pol, Menno Witteveen and Maarten Koopman, will contribute 50 million. WUR contributes 12 million, mainly in personnel and the use of laboratories at a reduced fee.
Witteveen: “The world population is expected to increase to 10 billion by the year 2050 and all these mouths must be fed with a planet that currently feeds 7 billion. The FAO has calculated that this can only be achieved through new scientific breakthroughs. One solution could be to grow crops that use sunlight more efficiently. Increasing our knowledge on these processes is, therefore, literally a matter of life and death.”
