David Biello, writing for Scientific American:
Can the world’s existing farmlands provide enough crops to satisfy the hunger of the nine billion people—up from seven billion currently—that demographers predict will be living on the planet by the mid-21st century? Or will more and more forests and other ecosystems have to be cleared to feed all the extra mouths? A new study, published in Nature on August 30, suggests that increasing deforestation could be avoided provided farmers made better use of water and nutrients on land currently under cultivation around the globe.
Wise fertilizer use and targeted intensification. Sounds about right.