Since 1985 to 2025, over those forty years, the incremental population per year is about 40 million. So over thirty years, we are going to have another four billion people over what we have today. We only have about thirty years where we have to make decisive action. Within the next thirty years, will biotechnology be able to insure food supply that can feed that many people? Will the biotechnology solutions become available within the next thirty years? If the answer is "no", then we have to be very pessimistic. Not the year 2025 -- by year 2025 the world population would exceed 8 billion. Frankly, the world population is 5.7 billion, but by the year 2025, it will exceed 8 billion. And then twenty-five years later, by 2050, the world population would reach 10 billion. We don't have to think that far into the future. Maybe we just have to concentrate on the year 2025, where the world population is expected to be 5 billion. And we have 85 million new people, babies born every year, and we have to supply enough food, shelter, and clothing to all these people. The world population will be 8 billion. Now what is the limit? What is the carrying capacity of the earth with regards to the population. That is the concern that we have.

Some people say that eight billion is the limit of the earth's carrying capacity. Of course this may vary, depending on the situation. But I think this could be one benchmark --eight billion.

The cultivated land on earth -- I don't remember the exact figure, but if I remember correctly the per-capita cultivated land should be point zero four (.04). So, many scholars believe that eight billion is the limit of the earth's carrying capacity vis-à-vis population.

Now, over the next 30 years, before the world population reaches eight billion, this is a critical path, this a decisive moment, Will biotechnology provide us with solutions? We don't know, we cannot be confident, And I'm sure the scientists and experts are working seriously on this, but we still cannot be -- we still cannot rest assure. So, we have to ad-dress the population and should.

As far as population is concerned and as has been discussed so far, we have to control the population so that we will not reach the world population on eight billion.

According to UN calculation, according to the medium-scale projection of the United Nations -- we will visit this population issue later, when I'm given more time -- we need to make extra effort to control the population growth. These are the microscopic issues, and there are some microscopic approaches that can be taken that vary from country to country, Dr, Kawano yesterday talked about the situation in Pakistan.

In Pakistan, irrigation is the key. In other countries, electricity supply is the key. In other country, something else is the key. So, the microscopic approaches may vary from country to country.

I'm afraid I've spend more time than I was allowed, so that is the end.