Genetically Modified Agriculture… A Solution or a Crisis?
Michel Morkos Al-Hayat - 28/04/08//
The global food crisis will not weather out if the superpowers do not defuse it or at least reduce its intensity, ease the impact of food price inflation on the poor and enable the hungry to access food. The concerned international bodies are pleading the member states, which are able to go through with the taken decisions, to find solutions to this crisis that has been raging for almost a year now. During this period, the prices of basic agricultural products have doubled, while middle-classes were no longer able to meet their basic needs. The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have both warned that the efforts by humanitarian organizations to decrease the number of poor and hungry people would be lost. The crisis might even increase the number of mal-nourished children from 800 million to one billion children.
Amidst the present crisis, the possible means to provide food must be highlighted. The success of agricultural production is linked to many factors, the most important of which is the convenience of weather conditions. In fact, weather conditions have changed and are now subject to greenhouse emissions, which caused extreme weather fluctuations with respect to rainfall or drought. Rain turned into flood and drought into oppressive heat. In both cases, the weather does not suit the currently adopted agriculture. Added to these factors are the adopted agricultural techniques capable of providing the sufficient supply of crops, mainly staples.
The world organizations estimated at 2.7% the growth in agricultural production needed to beat poverty and help implement the third millennium project in order to reduce the number of hungry people, while taking into consideration the world demographic growth. Yet, the organizations overlooked a potential decline in agricultural production or increase in demand for food in line with the economic boom witnessed by emerging nations. This in turn disrupted the balance of supply and demand or the balance of agricultural production and consumption.
During the agricultural crises in the 20th century, the international community faced the dilemma of supplying food, especially after two World Wars during which the lands were neglected, destroyed or turned into battlefields and military areas. Chemical fertilizers were used instead of organic ones in order to improve soil fertility and increase the productivity of cultivated areas. However, as these fertilizers were intensively used and different types non-compliant with the general safety norms were produced, the resulting agricultural production was said to violate the simplest rules of healthy food, especially that fertilizers were produced and animal hormones were used for vegetarian production.
The new agricultural revolution went on with intensifying research and creating new kinds of plants and seeds that are compatible with the weather and the soil specific to each region of the world. Rare are the countries that lack an agricultural research center, whose aim is to provide higher better-quality production and decrease production costs. In historical turns, agriculture benefited from the industrial revolution and its progress through time. It even used IT systems in cultivation and production after mechanization was introduced in many fields. Agriculture even took advantage of genetics to create a genetic modification in the most basic food agriculture. Hence, the genetically modified seeds were cultivated, spurring conflicting attitudes among world nations. Some scientific research institutions denied the economic futility of such cultivation, while others denied it increased production or reduced costs.
Today, the world cultivates around 115 million hectares of genetically modified agriculture. This represents around 7.7 percent of total cultivated areas in the world (1.5 billion hectares). The cultivations focus on cotton and grains, mainly corn, rice, colza, soya, canola, cotton, potatoes and tomatoes. Tree plants like willows were also genetically modified. 12 million cultivators work in that type of agriculture, in 23 countries, of which 12 are developed and 11 developing. 90 percent of cultivators are in developing countries that include emerging countries, while 97 percent of cultivated areas are located in developed countries. This indicates an imbalance in taking advantage of this agriculture between advanced industrial countries and developing and emerging ones, which did not make use of the genetically modified agriculture as it is promoted.
On an economic scale, this agriculture was estimated at $6.9 billion in 2007. It has a 16 percent stake in the world market for agriculture protection ($42.1 billion) and 20 percent in the seed market ($34 billion). The share of the industrial nations stands at 5.2 billions, compared with 1.6 billions for the developing nations. This year's harvest is estimated at $7.5 billion. Areas (in percentage) are distributed as follows: the US (51), Argentina (17), Brazil (13), Canada (6), India (5), China (2), Paraguay (2), bringing the total to 89 percent in the American continent alone. 8 out of 27 EU member countries consecrate only 100 thousand hectares for genetically modified agriculture.
The genetically modified agriculture is being promoted. The areas destined to this kind of agriculture are said to be more productive than when set aside for the production of non-modified seed. The high costs of buying modified seeds are met with their resilience against weeds and insects. Therefore there will be no need for pesticides. In addition, the modified agricultural production is healthy as promoted by the US Food and Drug Administration.
However, only one company, US Monsanto, monopolizes between 70 and 100 percent of the genetically modified seeds. Through it, the US can control world cultivation and production. The company has patents for every kind of seeds. It forbids cultivators from producing their own seeds and forces them to buy them annually from the company. A few years back, modified cotton did not produce the expected yield in India and farmers could not buy seeds, since some of them seemed sterile. They crossbred a special seed and increased the cotton-planted areas from 100 thousand to 500 thousand hectares between 2003 and 2004, but they are still facing lawsuits from the US firm. The multi-national company also monopolizes pesticides specific to these cultivations. Modified seeds have a 71-precent resistance against weeds, 18-percent resistance against harmful insects and 11-percent resistance against both insects and weeds.
Regardless of the productivity of genetically modified seed, some countries fear its effect on health, especially since Monsanto is the producer of the toxic orange gas used by the US in Vietnam. The company also used an agricultural pesticide for Cola forests in Columbia, which spread diseases among people. Therefore, the company's genetically modified products must be carefully used.
So, did the US instigate the food crisis as a means to control food worldwide or to market the products produced by its companies?
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