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Sir John Beddington warns 'anti-science' leads to poor policy decisions on climate change, GM crops

A former UK chief scientist has warned that politicians around the globe are ignoring science for the sake of short-term political opportunism.

This comes, Sir John Beddington argues, as growing urban populations are demanding more energy, water and food at a time when climate change is creating more natural weather disasters.

"If a politician completely ignores scientific advice, then they're in danger of making policy decisions which will prove to be unutterably wrong," Sir John told ABC Rural during a visit to Australia.

He said a "perfect-storm", as he first coined climate change in 2009, was continuing unabated, and needed more rapid and sensible responses from policies that engaged science.

"There is a movement in Europe which is just against any genetically-modified plant used for food [and] that is so naive," he said.

"There's no doubt in the developing world, plants can be modified to be resistant to drought or insect pests and that is going to be very, very important moving into the future.

Sir John argues that the reality of gene editing in plants was to produce plants that were resistant to droughts, pests and diseases, all while boosting yields.

The United Nations has forecasted that the global population would reach 10 billion people by 2050.

Sir John said that growth meant it was crucial political leaders addressed climate change to ensure people could be guaranteed access to food, water and energy.

"In the next decade, we'll continue to see another billion people on the planet, with a trend of urbanisation with rising income levels," he said.

"All are driving demand for more food, water and energy at the same time.

"It's inexorable — climate change is happening and will continue."

Eradicating malnutrition while tackling climate change

Recently, Sir John co-published a report in the journal Nature stating researchers must focus on malnutrition, even amid rising obesity.

He told ABC Rural that while the number of people starving had dropped to 800 million, the problem was far from over.

He said there was approximately 2 billion people experiencing malnutrition.

These people either lack sufficient levels of nutrients needed for proper development or are eating too much poor-quality food.

Sir John said with 25 per cent of children dying in the first few years of life, it robbed children of their social and economic potential.

"For every dollar invested in nutrition, you get $15 back," he said.

In an era of so-called 'anti-science', Sir John said it was more important than ever that scientist ensured their relevancy within society.

"I think there's a danger in the scientific community that we know more and know better than the common people," he said.

"That is not a sensible position for the scientists to have.

"What is sensible is to insist that this is the scientific evidence, you may not like it, but that is the evidence."