BIOTECHNOLOGY
The Promise of Food Security
Genetically modified food has got a bad rap for endangering the environment and human health, but without so much as a shred of scientific evidence as proof. In fact, for much of Asia, transgenics hold the key to increasing productivity and fighting hunger
By David Lague/HONG KONG
Issue cover-dated April 04, 2002
BIOLOGIST SEE YEE-AI remembers feeling a certain amount of empathy with the anti-biotechnology lobby in the late 1990s when she was a science reporter for The Star newspaper in Malaysia.
Over time, however, she felt that the weight of emerging scientific evidence suggested that genetically modified crops were safe or actually reduced harm to the environment. At the same time, disturbing reports of dangerous runaway genes, indestructible super weeds or harmful genetically modified foods remained unsubstantiated or turned out to be plainly false. "Science now shows there are environmental benefits but so far all the scares turned out to be just that," she says.
See, now executive director of the not-for-profit Malaysian Biotechnology Information Centre, is part of a growing scientific backlash against influential non-governmental organizations and green groups that oppose genetically modified, or GM, food and crops. "Biotechnology is a very powerful tool that Asian countries could use to increase production as well as compete efficiently on global markets," she says. "But, it has been vilified to a very great extent."
Defenders of biotechnology and other modern agricultural technologies claim the stakes for Asia are enormous if the adoption of these advances is needlessly delayed or blocked. Demand for food and for income continue to expand with population while land and water available for agriculture diminish in the face of soil degradation and encroaching cities and industries. The United Nations' median projections show the world's population growing from today's 6 billion to about 9 billion by 2050, much of this growth in areas where food shortage and malnourishment are already serious problems.
The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization calculates that about 1.35 billion hectares of land are now under cultivation worldwide but almost 10 million hectares are lost each year through degradation alone. In rapidly growing economies with high rates of population and industrial growth, the losses are even more pronounced. Chinese authorities estimate that about 6 million hectares of arable land were lost in China in the year 2000 alone. Biotechnology advocates say there is only one way out, now that the extraordinary yield increases of the Green Revolution that saw food production nearly triple over the last 50 years are beginning to taper off--agricultural production must become more efficient and productive.
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