Biotechnology Number 2

I feel that biotechnology is the way of 21st century agriculture. If people plan on proliferating at this extreme rate, biotechnology transfers from convenience to necessity. Biotech not only increases framers profit margins, but it provides enough food for a hungry world. But the many positive affects of biotechnology do not exist without their obverse affects.

The Green Revolution is responsible for the survival of millions of people who would of otherwise starved. The rate of farm productivity due to farming practices is still increasing, but has slowed. The world needs a new advance in agriculture to boost its productivity to match the ever-growing population. Biotechnology, also known as the 'gene revolution' is this much needed advance. With the technology of today, we can make the plants themselves more productive, not just the land. Biotechnology can make the plants produce more grain or fruit, produce anti-insect toxins, produce increased resistance to pesticides and fertilizers, and even produce medicine. This increase in productivity has lead to increase in food and profit margin.

But a negative shadow looms over biotechnology 's bright future. With the manipulating of genes comes many moral and health issues. Is changing the blueprints of life right? Can it harm us? Will it cause cancer 10 years down the road? All are valid questions yet to be answered. The United States values productivity, while other countries or bands of countries like the European Union value the safety of their food supply. The European Union requires that all of their grains must be properly labeled if containing genetically modified organisms. The United States on the other hand, has found no health issues with genetically modified organisms, so requires no such labeling. This does create discrepancies for U.S. farmers. Farmers in the U.S. cannot export their products to the countries requiring labels unless they label their food themselves. The added worry and cost of labels makes it hard for American farmers to compete in European markets.

Both sides of the argument have valid viewpoints. But I think as long as biotechnology is doing good, and its effects are proved to be harmless, no labels should be required. Labels only urge the consumer into thinking there could be something wrong with the food when it is perfectly healthy. The labels are also and added cost to the farmer, unnecessarily raising the price of food.

Biotechnology: Transgenic Cotton

The genetic manipulation of plants has been going on for centuries, but now speedy genetic engineering can replace the slow tedious process of cross-breeding distinct varieties. There are several ways of genetically manipulating a plant, including: infecting the plant with a plasmid carrying the gene, and shooting microscopic pellets containing the desired gene directly into the plant cell. There is no real distinction between somatic and germ line cells in plants, this makes it easier to genetically manipulate plants than animals(http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/T/TransgenicPlants.html).

The complicated gene manipulating procedures of the cotton plant are done for a variety of reasons. Insect resistance (Bt) is produced by the Monsanto company to control tobacco bud worm and cotton bollworm. Glyphosate (roundup) tolerance has also been developed by Monsanto to increase cotton's resistance to herbicides. With glyphosate, a cotton field can be completely sprayed with roundup, and a minimal amount of the cotton plants will die, if any. Bromoxynil (BXN) tolerance has also been produced by Monsanto for the same purpose as glyphosate. Sulfonylurea (SU) tolerance has been developed by DuPont also for herbicide resistance. 25% of the cotton population was transgenic in 1997, the percentage jumped to 45% a year later (http://filebox.vt.edu/cals/cses/chagedor/cotton.html). In 2007 the percentage of transgenic cotton crops ranged from 100% in Arkansas and Tennessee, to 71% in California (http://www.ams.usda.gov/cottonrpts/MNPDF/mp_cn833.PDF).


Higher crop yields, improved nutritional value, salinity resistance, decrease in pesticide and fertilizer use, decreases in tilling and other farm labor are just some of the positive aspects of using bioengineered crops. However, destruction of native crop diversity and possible consequent native crop failure has led to farmer suicide in some cases. Monsanto released a transgenic variety of cotton into several southern India states. Coupled with debt and drought, 70 farmers committed suicide - their deaths are being blamed on the biotechnology company Monsanto (http://www.mindfully.org/GE/2003/Monsanto-Indian-Farmers11sep03.htm). Some countries will not even accept genetically modified foods. Starving African countries have denied our aid because the corn we offered was genetically modified. Genetically modified foods have their positives and negatives; but they are here to stay, so we should find a middle ground of perhaps growing them in a nature friendly manner.

Green Revolution

I think that new technology is needed to keep increasing food production. The population of the world is almost certainly going to keep growing to an unfathomable amount. The only way to keep up with the booming population is to having a booming agriculture as well. An industrial revolution was needed to moderize the growing western civilization in a sanitary fashion. Large cities could not function with their large populations without the aid of modern sewage systems and other modern structures. The indutrial revolution met the needs of a population living in close quaters. Now the world needs an agricultural revolution to feed those hungry people and their children. New technology is needed to keep increasing food production; but there is a sustainable way to do so.

The world does need technology incorporated into its farming practices for sure, but it needs this scientific knowledge supplemented in a sustainable way. If not implemented with the future in mind, technology could lead to disastrous ends. We must think like the Native Americans who believed in thinking about how each of their actions will affect their future generations. High-impact modern 'green revolution' type farming no-doubtedly has negative impacts on the environment. Loss of bio-diversity, droughts, erosion, poisoning from pesticides and fertilizers are some of the detrimental effects of the 'green revolution'. These advanced farming practices have the good intent of being able to feed expodential amounts of people but farms must do so with the environment in mind. We should put its name to use and turn this 'green revolution' into a revolution of agriculture that has the main goal of perpetuating all of the green in our world, while also feeding our people.


Modern technology is the only way to provide the world's population with a sufficient amount of food. If one wanted to feed the population of the world using traditional techniques, an unrealistic amount of acerage would be needed. Farmland is being closed in on by the growing poulation. Rural communities are being replaced by suburbs. The only way to get more food out of less amount of land is by increasing the efficeintcy of the land, farming techniques, and the plants themselves. Plant hybrids must be produced that require less fertilizer, pesticides, and water. This all is possible, but positive feedback from the public is needed. The world cannot expect to get all natural or original type of plants when they are having seven children each. Each child is going to encroach on even more farnmland. There is a way for these plant hybrids to be grown in a natural way that sustains the environment for future generations. Hybrid plants should be grown with other hybrid plants in a field with the lowest amount of tilling possible so the environment is kept in an as natural state as possible.

Modern technology is definitely needed to feed the growing world population. The 'green revolution' does not have to be a set of reckless techniques that disregard the environment. New technolgy should be coupled with the natutral style of growing. In a natural setting, agricultural plants may live in a harmonious cycle with the earth rather than at an unnatural grueling pace. This will sustain the resources of our earth in a way that feeds our people.