Food security rates high as global challenge: Survey
Food security is an issue that looms large in the minds of the world’s leading scientists. Will this translate into any action or are there too many human-inspired hurdles?
Food security looms large in the minds of the world’s leading scientists as a pressing concern for us humans. This one of the results from a New Scientist survey of scientists from the InterAcademy Panel, the global network of the world’s science academies, that recently met at the Royal Society in London.
Food security ranked second on a global level and third on a national level on a long list of concerns facing humanity. It is interesting to note that at a global level nearly double the scientists from low income and developing nations (20 versus 11) said food security was a primary concern. A t national level the difference is even greater: 21 scientists from low and developing nations placed it top of the concern heap compared to just five from the rich nations.
Time to act
Although many of these scientists will be in fields unrelated to any agricultural-based sciences it does highlight that it is probably something we act on sooner rather than later.
But….
I have come across two contrasting views this week that don’t bode well for anyone doing anything about this anytime soon: One from Julian Cribb in a feature mentioned in the previous TechNyou blog post, the second from the South Australian Genetic Food Information Network on a post entitled GM Food Fibs.
Julian Cribb is doing the rounds to promote his new book, but he is aptly qualified to comment on this stuff. He fears we face a new famine if we don’t double R&D efforts in agriculture, which has been on a steady decline the past few decades. He suggests we double global investment in agricultural science, estimating we need to lift the total agrifood R&D spend to at least $80 billion. As a comparison, Cribb says we spend about $1500 billion on weapons.
The section from the SA Gen Food Network’s post is in response to the alleged fib that GM foods are needed to save millions in developing countries from starvation. They say, “As anyone who has studied global hunger knows, there is enough food to feed the world. People starve because food is inequitably distributed. Wars and conflict are mostly to blame. World starvation will be solved through political solutions, not technical fixes. So, it is quite misleading to suggest that the problem can be overcome without radical political change.”
Doomed either way…
Trigger point?
This is not my area of expertise but somehow I don’t think we are going to solve the problem of war and corruption for a long time, if ever, though we may be able to do something about distribution and associated infrastructure.
The planet will contain an extra 3-4 billion people in the next 40-50 years. To feed them it seems we need to solve all or many of the issues presented by Cribb and the SA Food Network.
GM foods are definitely not going to feed the world, but leaving aside any real or perceived safety concerns, they may be a useful tool to be used in conjunction with the many other modern plant breeding tools and agronomic technologies and systems being investigated.
So the question is, as presented in the last blog post, will this possible predicted famine – or food security concern – be the trigger that makes GM technology acceptable? By that I don’t mean every GM food should automatically be accepted, but that it isn’t automatically rejected simply because it is GM.
Trust
The other interesting result from the New Scientist survey is that compared to the scientists from the rich countries those from developing countries perceive that the public have a much higher degree of trust of science.
It is arguably a lack of trust in the government regulators and scientific advice that has contributed to public concerns about GM foods in rich countries. Does that mean if poorer nations with a greater trust in science develop a GM crop to solve a local agronomic issue will have a greater acceptability?
GM crops wont solve future food shortages or help starving countries. We already have too much food but it’s not getting to the starving people. Roundup Ready seed increases Roundup use and crops are sprayed with Roundup while growing. How much of the herbicide remains in the harvested crop? What will the effect on the environment be from using more herbicides? Weeds are now becoming resistant to Roundup so what will they use next?
GM crops can cross pollinate with crops more than 5kms away. Farmers all over the world are being sued by biotech companies when their standard crops are cross pollinated from a nearby GM farm.
The thing that concerns me most however is Terminator seeds. If terminator seeds cross pollinate with standard seeds, all the standard seeds will become useless. Farmers won’t be able use their own seeds they’ve been growing for decades and they will be forced to buy new seed every year from the Biotech companies. If farmers can’t afford to buy seed they’ll go broke and wont be able to grow anymore. This will increase the risk of starvation all around the world and pretty much guarantee a global food shortage, especially in third world countries.
Pauline
A few clarifications probably needed on my part here re: your post.
Re: GM food feeding the world. Nobody I know is suggesting that GM food is going to solve future food shortages, so I think you’ll find anyone working in agricultural and plant breeding space will agree with you. It is simply one potential tool among many that plant breeders can use to solve specific problems, whether they are plant diseases, abiotic stresses (frost, drought, salinity, etc), nutritional, or making plants more efficient at using the available nutrients.
Just about every comment I have read or any expert I have spoken to on this subject acknowledges that we have enough food about at the moment to feed the world and that distribution, infrastructure, corruption, war, poverty, waste…and so on are responsible for people going hungry. These same experts (everyone from WHO to the Julian Cribb) are also saying that in the next 50-60 years we are going to have another 3-4 billion people to feed and we need to feed them in the face of predicted diminishing supplies of water and fertiliser, and without any increase in land available to grow the food. And these are just some of the impediments that need to be overcome. The other question, of course, is will humans as a global population have solved the issues that are causing hunger today?
You are correct, that Roundup Ready crops (and any other herbicide tolerant crops) will probably increase the use of that particular herbicide. Roundup (or Glyphosate) can only be sprayed in the first couple of weeks after emergence of the crop – about the four-leaf stage. Considering you don’t eat the leaves of corn, cotton, or canola, the amount of chemical remaining following harvest months later, I suspect, will be almost undetectable as it will have been rained on countless times. It is in the soil that you may be able to detect the breakdown products of whatever herbicide you use. And although glyphosate is not totally benign, you should probably be more worried about the amount of Atrazine that persists on plants, or more importantly in the soil, after the Atrazine-tolerant canola has been harvested. Atrazine-tolerant canola is a non-GM crop.
Re: weed resistance to herbicides. Yes this is an issue and it has been an issue long before GM crops came on the scene. The incorrect use of herbicide-tolerant crops, whether they be GM or conventional, is likely to exacerbate this problem. Hence the need for strict adherence to sound agronomic practices that includes crop and chemical rotation and integrated pest management. The big question is whether strict adherence will happen.
Monsanto suing farmers
You are correct that if a farmer illegally plants GM’s patented crop they are likely to be sued, but Monsanto will not sue farmers if they have inadvertently got some of their non-GM harvest or crop contaminated with GM. In the US alone more than 275,000 farmers have bought GM seed from Monsanto – and there are about five other large multi-national companies selling GM seed worldwide also. I have heard of very few cases where Monsanto or any other company has filed a lawsuit against a farmer.
Re: terminator seeds. First clarification is that there is no such thing as terminator genes in crops at the moment and it isn’t just Monsanto that was or is doing research in this area. The initial and highly controversial concept behind it was, as you suggest, to protect the intellectual property of the seed developer. But there are numerous public-funded research groups and other private interests working on this technology in its many forms with its many uses in mind.
One of the uses will be to ensure that GM crops do not cross-pollinated with non-GM crops. That is, if the pollen is sterile then they cannot fertilise other crops.
The GMO-safety web site has some information on this topic
http://www.gmo-safety.eu/en/gene_transfer/confinement/466.docu.html
As does GMO compass
http://www.gmo-compass.org/eng/safety/environmental_safety/173.environmental_safety_stopping_spread_foreign_genes.html
Remember that hybrid crops also force farmers to re-purchase seed each year, though their yields are higher than non-hybrid versions, so the expense is usually justified.
And assuming choices remain available for a farmer, if they want to save seed for the following year they simply need to purchase seed that is non-GM or non-hybrid.
So to clarify my post as a whole, the technologies behind the production of GM foods and crops can play a role in securing a sustainable food supply. How big that role might be is yet to be determined. The crucial issue is will people accept it and in the above post I ask whether the real threat of a famine will be the trigger for people to suddenly be less risk adverse toward transgenic technology and therefore accept certain GM foods. I say certain GM foods because each GM crop or food has a different set of risks and benefits and therefore each GM crop should judged on a case-by-case basis. This may be controversial, but I suggest that most people do this unconsciously already. I have come across only a tiny minority of people that are either totally for or totally against GM foods, regardless of the crop and its intended use.
Other TechNyou posts that may be of interest
http://tinyurl.com/245l4p3
http://tinyurl.com/2cmthpl
http://tinyurl.com/2a9p3ye
http://tinyurl.com/24suqkz
Jason
TechNyou