By Henrylito D. Tacio
As a result of climate change, global food shortages will become three times more likely, warns news site Al Jazeera, quoting a report from a joint US-British taskforce. The report urged the international community “to be ready to respond to potentially dramatic future rises in prices.”
The Taskforce on Extreme Weather and Global Food System Resilience said that “food shortages, market volatility and price spikes are likely to occur at an exponentially higher rate of every 30 years by 2040.”
Al Jazeera quoted David King, the United Kingdom foreign minister’s Special Representative for Climate Change, as saying: “The climate is changing and weather records are being broken all the time. The risks of an event are growing, and it could be unprecedented in scale and extent.”
How can this looming food crisis be averted?
In man’s quest for food security, has he found the solution in biotechnology?
Advocates say it is. Opponents, however, insist it is not.
In 1994, the FlavSavr tomato was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in the United States. It became the first genetically modified (GM) food crop to be produced and consumed in an industrialized country.
Since then, several countries have contributed to more than a 20-fold increase in the global area of transgenic crops despite adamant claims that GM foods are dangerous and unhealthy.
Biotechnology encompasses an array of tools and applications that allow scientists to manipulate the genetic materials of plants, microbes, and animals. These methods provide ways to modify the characteristics that are passed from one generation to the next.
Unknowingly, biotechnology has existed since time immemorial. Spirulina, one of the oldest forms of life on earth, is believed to be what the ancient Israelites of the Old Testament called “manna from heaven.”
The modern era of biotechnology, however, had its origin in 1953 when American biochemist James Watson and British biophysicist Francis Crick presented their “double helix” molecular model of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). Nine years later, both received the coveted Nobel Prize for their collaborative work.
Science tells us that DNA, the genetic material of all cellular organisms and most viruses, carries the information needed to direct so-called “protein synthesis” and “replication.” Protein synthesis, if you care to know, is “the production of the proteins needed by the cell or virus for its activities and development.” Replication, on the other hand, is “the process by which DNA copies itself for each descendant cell or virus, passing on the information needed for protein synthesis.”
In its wider sense, biotechnology also includes biological processes used in the food industry. Some of these have been used for centuries: yeasts to help bread rise and convert sugar into alcohol in brewing, and bacteria to digest sugars and add flavor in cheese making. All these techniques, however, use naturally-occurring organisms.
But the tools used in modern biotechnology include gene cloning, tissue culture, microbial culture, DNA-marker technology and genetic engineering. The latter is the most controversial as it is the method used in developing genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
Currently, there are two primary methods used for introducing transgenes into plant genomes. “The first involves a device called a ‘gene gun,’” the International Service for the Acquisition of Agribiotech Applications (ISAAA) pointed out in a briefing paper. “The DNA to be introduced into the plant cells is coated onto tiny particles. These particles are then physically shot onto plant cells. Some of the DNA comes off and is incorporated into the DNA of the recipient plant. The second method uses a bacterium to introduce the gene(s) of interest into the plant DNA.”
In industrialized countries, there is clear evidence that the use of GM crops has resulted in significant benefits. These include: higher crop yields, reduced farm costs, increased farm profit and improvement in the environment.
The so-called “first generation” crops have been proven their ability to lower farm-level production costs. Rosalie Ellasus, who plants Bt corn in her farm in San Jacinto, Pangasinan, can attest to this. “The difference is amazing, lalo na sa pag-spray!” she reported.
Bt corn is an insect-damage-immune corn that contains a naturally occurring substance, Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) protein, which is the active ingredient in safe and effective sprays for more than 50 years. The production of this protein directly by corn plants has virtually revolutionized insect control, making the lives and work of farmers better.
Currently, research is focused on “second-generation” GM crops that will feature increased nutritional and/or industrial traits. These crops will have more direct benefits to consumers. Examples include: rice enriched with iron and vitamin A (known as golden rice), potatoes with higher starch content, edible vaccines in corn and potatoes, corn varieties able to grow in poor conditions, and healthier oils from soybean and canola.
Pro-GMO advocates and scientists argue that biotechnology is essential to food security. This is particularly true in the Philippines, where the population is growing fast and land area for cultivation is getting smaller. Currently, the country is home to 101.6 million people — and still growing each year.
“We’re the buckle of the typhoon belt, the jewel of the ring of fire. We have scarce land and will soon have scarce water,” deplored Dr. Segfredo Serrano, the agriculture undersecretary for policy, planning, research and development. “We have to be very open to scientific advances with proper precaution to solve the eternal problem of food security.”
ISAAA echoes the same notion. “In countries where there is often no enough food to go around and where food prices directly affect the incomes of majority of the population, the potential benefits of GM crops cannot be ignored,” it said. “It is true that nutritionally enhanced foods may not be a necessity in developed countries but they could play a key role in helping to alleviate malnutrition in developing countries.”
But Greenpeace, an anti-GMO organization, continues to take a preventive stance. It cautioned that consumers can never be absolutely sure of the safety of GMOs since this is only determined by decades of data and study.
One of the public’s biggest concerns related to GM foods is that an allergen (a protein that causes an allergic reaction) could be accidentally introduced into a food product.
“Allergenicity screening is a very important part of safety testing before a crop can enter into the food market,” ISAAA explained. “A variety of tests and questions must be considered to determine whether the food poses any increased risk of allergenicity.”
Antibiotic resistance is another concern. “The likelihood of antibiotic resistance genes moving from GM crops to any other organisms is extremely remote,” ISAAA assured. “Even in the unlikely event that an antibiotic resistance gene is transferred to another organism, the impact of this transfer would be negligible, as the markers used in GM crops have limited clinical or veterinary use.”
Other potential risks include: the likelihood of transgenes escaping from cultivated crops into wild relatives; the potential for pests to evolve resistance to the toxins produced by GM crops; and the risk of these toxins affecting non-target organisms.
But the big question is: Are GM foods safe for human consumption?
“Foods produced using genetic modification is as safe as foods produced using conventional breeding techniques,” assures the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). “Genetically modified foods are as safe as other foods available on the market.”
The Geneva-based World Health Organization (WHO) declared that different GM foods go through the global food safety process called Codex Alimentarius Risk Analysis of Foods Derived from Modern Biotechnology under which these foods are not found to be risky to human health.
“GM foods currently available on the international market have passed risk assessments and are not likely to present risks for human health,” said the UN health agency in a statement.
“No effects on human health have been shown as a result of the consumption of such foods by the general population in the countries where they have been approved. Continuous use of risk assessments based on the Codex principles and, where appropriate, including post market monitoring, should form the basis for evaluating the safety of GM foods,” it added.
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