The method might be the key to the widescale production of fuel from algae, which is thought to be the better option over making it from land-based crops such as soya and corn, since the yields are much greater and there is no competition with food-crop production, and provide a real alternative to a globalized world that is utterly dependent on supplies of imported crude oil.

FORBES: 'Artificial Cells' May Provide Souce Of Algal Fuel

Seventy-five per cent of the food crop varieties we once grew have disappeared from our fields in the last 100 years.

FORBES: The Future of Life On Earth: Part Two Of The Discussion

Sudan is letting investors export 70% of the crop, even though it is the recipient of the largest food-aid operation in the world.

ECONOMIST: Buying farmland abroad

If the mega-sized farms of the current modern factory farm system were suddenly beset by a shortage of modern petro-based pesticides and herbicides, those farms would all suffer massive crop failures, and food would become scarce all around the world in less than two years.

FORBES: Peak Oil and ERoEI: Still Nonsense