MANILA, Philippines - Biotechnology or genetically modified (GM) crops can considerably help countries across the world attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) set by the United Nations (UN), an international agency has asserted.
This is particularly true with the first of the eight MDGs, which is, “Eradicate extreme hunger and poverty by half by 2015.”
The other MDGs are: Achieve universal primary education; promote gender equality and empower women; reduce child mortality; improve maternal life; combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases; ensure environmental sustainability; and develop a global partnership for development.
The UN MDGs form a blueprint agreed to by all nations and the world’s leading development institutions.
“By far the most important role of biotech crops will be their contribution to the humanitarian Millennium Development Goals of ensuring a secure supply of affordable food and the reduction of poverty and hunger by 50 percent by 2015,” stated the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA).
Dr. Clive James, ISAAA founder and current board chairman, discussed global biotechnology issues at a science forum in Makati City jointly sponsored by ISAAA, the Los Baños-based, government-hosted Southest Asian Ministers of Education Organization-Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEAMEO SEARCA), and National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST).
New York (USA)-based ISAAA is a not-for-profit organization with a global network of centers that share knowledge and crop biotechnology applications. The network includes a Southeast Asian center in Los Baños headed by Dr. Randy Hautea.
Dr. James reported that about 14 million farmers in 16 developing and nine industrial countries planted GM crops in 134 million hectares in 2009.
Eight of the countries each planted biotech crops in more than one million hectares: the United States (64 million ha), Brazil (21.4 million ha), Argentina (21.3 million ha), Canada (8.2 million ha), China (3.7 million ha), Paraguay (2.2 million ha), and South Africa (2.1 million ha).
The balance of 2.7 million ha was grown by Uruguay, Bolivia, the Philippines, Australia, Burkina Faso, Spain, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Honduras, Czech Republic, Portugal, Romania, Poland, Costa Rica, Slovakia and Egypt.
“Notably,” Dr. James reported, “almost half (46 percent) of the global hectarage was planted by developing countries, expected to take the lead from industrial nations before 2015, the MDG Year, when global society has pledged to cut hunger and poverty in half. Biotech crops are already contributing to this goal.”
Soybean, the dominant biotech crop commercially grown in 11 countries in 2009, occupied 62 million ha (52 percent of the global biotech crop area).
Maize was the second most dominant GM crop, occupying 26 million ha in the US, Canada, South Africa, the Philippines, Honduras, Argentina and Chile.
The third was Bt cotton (12.4 million ha in 10 countries).
Summing up, Dr. James cited a World Bank Development Report which asserted: “Agriculture is a vital development tool for achieving the Millennium Development Goals that call for halving by 2015 the share of people suffering from extreme hunger and poverty.”