Wednesday | 11 December 2024 | Reg No- 06
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Wednesday | 11 December 2024 | Epaper

GM food: The best way for sustainable food production?

Published : Sunday, 28 May, 2023 at 12:00 AM  Count : 844
Deutsche Welle
Genetically modified food remains controversial, especially in Europe, but for some experts it is the best science-based method for a sustainable global food system amidst biodiversity loss and a rising Population. Producing food is terrible for the environment. According to the online scientific publication Our World in Data, agriculture is responsible for a quarter of the carbon emissions in the atmosphere and the vast majority of world's biodiversity losses.

And while environmental decline goes on, the world's population keeps growing. The UN predicts the world population will reach 10 billion in 2057. This raises the question: how do we increase food production by 50% while mitigating the catastrophes of biodiversity loss and the climate crisis? "We've come to understand that using more land for agriculture is the biggest sin with respect to climate change and biodiversity. This means we need to produce food on less land so we can protect nature," said Matin Qaim, a specialist in food economics and director of the Center for Development Research at the University of Bonn in Germany.

Qaim explained that, broadly speaking, there are two different approaches for how to do this. "One strand says we need dietary changes to make consumption more sustainable. That means less waste, less meat. The other strand argues we need better technologies to create more environmentally friendly methods of agriculture," he told DW. Qaim thinks both approaches are necessary. For one, we need to change the way food is produced - in particular, reducing human consumption of proteins and nutrients from animal sources. But it's not enough. Like many experts, he thinks gene technologies are a crucial part of the strategy for a sustainable food system.

"Everyone wants to produce more food from less area and with less chemical pesticides, and with less fertilizer. If you're able to [use gene technologies to] develop plants that are more tolerant and more resistant, it's a good thing," said Qaim. Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are organisms that have altered DNA to change their properties. Genetically modified crops can improve yield, build resistances to pests, frost or drought, or add nutrients. Crops can also be modified to reduce carbon emissions and boost the sustainability of food production. While widespread, GM crop production uses only about 10% of the land non-GM crop production uses.

"GM is nothing more than a breeding technique, much like crossing that we've been doing for thousands of years. But it's more sophisticated, so we can make very precise changes, very rapidly," said David Spencer, a phytopathologist and spokesperson for Replanet, an alliance of NGOs advocating for science-based solutions to climate change and the loos of biodiversity. It's campaign Reboot Foodfocuses on sustainable food production. GMOs were first introduced in the US in 1994, with modified tomato plants that ripened more slowly to prolong their shelf life. Since then, a wide range of crops, such as soybeans, wheat and rice have been approved for agricultural use, along with GM bacteria grown to produce large amounts of protein.

Scientists in India have also developed strains of Sub-1 rice, which are much more resistant to flooding. Flooding is a major issue in rice-growing regions of northern India and Bangladesh, set to become worse as the climate crises develops, and now 6 million farmers in the region are using Sub-1 rice to safeguard their crops against inundation. Golden rice, on the other hand, is a GM strain modified to contain vitamin A, designed to combat the shortage of dietary vitamin A in parts of Asia and Africa. Gene editing technology has also helped save crop production from blights. In the late 20th century, the papaya ringspot virus almost wiped-out papaya crops in Hawaii, but a local scientist developed a modified papaya that was resistant to the virus. Seeds were distributed to farmers, saving papaya production a decade later.

GM agriculture is moving on from the Monsanto big-dog corporate model. GM products are increasingly focused on social and public enterprise and the industry is looking at more local solutions that help smallholder farmers in developing countries. Regulation and licensing are a huge part of this. Many, including Replanet, strongly advocate for open-source seeds and GM technologies.

"You can develop GMOs without patents developed by humanitarian public organizations. We need to regulate in a smart way and ensure there's competition in the market. Corporate industrial agriculture is the wrong model," said Qaim.

Ultimately, it's about creating a licensing landscape that empowers local farmers to adapt to the demands of sustainable agriculture, but quickly enough to meet rising populations and climate change.


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