Balita.ph February 12, 2012 11:30 am
By Janice M. Cave

MANILA, Feb 12 — Genetically-modified (GM) crops are crucial in significantly reducing poverty and hunger rates worldwide and may even allow developing countries to meet their Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015, a biotech expert said.

“Biotech crops have the potential to make a substantial contribution to the 2015 MDGs of cutting poverty in half, by optimizing crop productivity, which can be expedited by public-private sector partnerships, such as the drought tolerant maize for Africa supported by philanthropic entities such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation,” said Clive James, founder and chairman of the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA).

He said the achievement of MDGs goes hand-in-hand with advances in the cultivation of GM crops and noted that by 2015, there will be an increase of about 10 countries adopting biotech crops.

The first biotech-based drought tolerant corn is planned for release in North America in 2013 and in Africa by 2017, he noted.

The so-called "Golden Rice" will be commercialized in the Philippines between 2013 and 2014 while biotech corn in China has the potential of being cultivated in 30 million hectares, with Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) rice following thereafter.

“Stacked traits are an important feature —12 countries planted biotech crops with two or more traits in 2011, and encouragingly 9 of the 12 were developing countries— 42.2 million hectares, or more than a quarter, of the 160 million hectares were stacked in 2011, up from 32.3 million hectares or 22 percent of the 148 million hectares in 2010,” James said.

The five lead developing countries in biotech crops are India and China in Asia, Brazil and Argentina in Latin America and South Africa. These countries represent 40 percent of the global population, which would reach 10.1 billion by 2100.

“Brazil, for the third year, was the engine of growth globally, increasing its hectarage of biotech crops more than any other country—a record 4.9 million hectares, up 20 percent from 2010. A fast-track system approved six new products in 2011, including a homegrown biotech virus resistant bean, developed in the public sector by EMBRAPA ( Brazilian Agricultural Research Cooperation),” James said. (PNA) LDV/jmc/jsd

Source: Biotech crucial to meeting MDGs