Why GMOs Matter In Humanity’s Conquest Of Hunger And Extreme Poverty

History is replete with unforgettable episodes of famine that brought untold misery and death upon humanity. In 1798, an influential English cleric and scholar by name, Rev. Thomas R. Malthus, predicted doom for humanity in his controversial essays on the principle of population. In these essays, he argued that, the arithmetic increase in food supply does not commensurate with the geometric multiplication of human population; hence, the human population will eventually outstrip the food supply. In Malthus’ view, famine or food shortage was inevitable, and regarded it as a necessary force to repress the superior power of the human population in order to keep it in balance with the means of subsistence.

In the centuries that followed, the purveyors of humanity’s food staples demonstrated through technological progress that, we can geometrically increase food supply to feed the ever-increasing human population. Humanity thus, at least proved Malthus wrong for underestimating the capability of mankind in feeding the world and safeguarding ourselves against his cataclysmic predictions. It must however be noted that, humanity narrowly escaped the Malthusian population spell, for there are many who still live in extreme poverty and are afflicted with hunger. The United Nations in 2000, set forth eight Millennium Development Goals, among which eradication of extreme poverty and hunger featured prominently. In its current report, it was revealed that, from 1990 till date, the proportion of undernourished people in the world has been halved to about 13%, but millions numbering about 800 million still face starvation and undernourishment.

The human population has followed the Malthusian rate closely and we are now a little over seven billion, and it is projected to reach nine billion or even 11 billion in the coming decades. In order to meet the food demand for this burgeoning population, we would need to increase food production by at least 60%. There is however, a new threat besides overpopulation that could undo all gains in our food production system. This new threat is climate change. The manner in which agriculture was practiced in the last century in our attempt to meet the food needs of the world was far from perfect. Modern agriculture has been implicated as a major contributing factor to climate change. Modern agriculture must thus enter into a new transition that would ensure sustainability in order to mitigate the devastating effects of climate change. This new transition entails a change in farming methods to ensure sustainability without compromising on productivity. We must now adopt farming methods that would not degrade our environment but at the same time increase food productivity. This is the gap organic agriculture seeks to fill, but it lacks some essential qualities for it to constitute a viable alternative to modern conventional agriculture.

Firstly, the formidable task facing humanity to once again prove Malthus wrong, necessitates the application of science and agricultural technology. A viable alternative to modern conventional agriculture must be able to double current food production using less land and water resources and also reduce the average human efforts in food production in an economically viable manner. This is because, it is envisaged that, in the coming decades, less land and water will be available for food production, and agricultural labor will be in a decline. Secondly, a viable alternative should be able to at least maintain world food prices or better still reduce it. This is of utmost importance because, the very people which suffer hunger are the same people that live in abject poverty and dehumanizing conditions, hence making food more affordable and accessible to these people would be the best way forward. Organic agriculture lacks these essential elements described above, even though it is environmentally friendly. Produce of organic agriculture are the most expensive across grocery stores, due to the high cost embedded in its production and labor intensiveness.

Thirdly, in order to reduce green-house gas emissions in our attempt to reverse climate change, the world must shift its energy needs towards renewable fuel sources, which presupposes an increased reliance on plants for biofuels. This demand also, cannot be met through organic agriculture in its current state, due to the fact that, it rejects the very technology that could have made this possible. Organic agriculture rejects GMOs (genetically modified organisms) produced via genetic engineering. A number of articles have been written by proponents of GMOs to instill confidence in the general public about their safety or to educate them about their real benefits and potential usefulness. With the debate still lingering on, this article thus seeks to reinforce some of the claims made by proponents and also to counter some of the falsehood being peddled by opponents of GMOs.

Without any controversy, the first generation of GMOs were designed to help farmers to effectively control plant insect pests and weeds. It must be emphasized that, the unabating public backlash to GMOs to an inextricable degree, could be attributed to the bad first impression these first generation of GMOs supposedly made on environmentalists. Important crops such as corn, soybean, cotton and canola became the pioneer crops to be genetically modified and commercialized.

The first generation of GMOs were designed to be resistant to some herbicides (a group of pesticides for killing plants, but are usually targeted at unwanted plants on farmlands called weeds) or were made to be resistant to some insect pests. It must be noted here that, these GMOs were designed specifically to address two of the major limiting factors besetting food production-- weed and insect pest infestations. These herbicide-resistant and insect-resistant GMOs made farming very easy for farmers and were quickly adopted by farmers in the US, Canada, China, Brazil, India etc. despite the heavy restrictions.

The herbicide-resistant GMOs for instance, made weed control very easy and effective, by allowing farmers to selectively kill all unwanted plants on their farmlands without harming their crop plants. Environmental movements that were against the use of pesticides in farming became alarmed, because to them, these herbicide-resistant GMOs were encouraging the widespread use of pesticides, even though the indiscriminate use and abuse of pesticides by some farmers predate the introduction of GMOs. Interestingly, the insect-resistant GMOs on the other hand, were made to reduce the use of insecticides (another group of pesticides for killing insects but are generally targeted at insect pests). The environmental movements, instead of applauding the technology for such a great achievement, once again irrationally accused the insect-resistant GMOs for killing non-target and harmless insects. The environmentalists therefore sought to denigrate the assured benefits of these GMOs and also discredit the significance of the technology for producing GMOs through fear mongering tactics so as to pitch the public against it.

The rationale for producing these first generation of GMOs was to help farmers reduce the cost of producing food, reduce pesticide use, increase productivity and make farming less laborious. There are irrefutable results that attest to these asserted real benefits associated with the adoption of GMOs by farmers across the globe. Since their time of introduction in 1996, the land area under cultivation of GMOs has increased more than 100-fold from 1.7 million hectares to about 182 million hectares as at the end of 2014. Similarly, the number of countries that have adopted GMOs have increased from 6 to 28 by the end of 2014. Even in Europe where the greatest opposition exists, there are currently five European countries that grow GMOs; namely Spain, Portugal, Czech Republic, Romania, and Slovakia. In Africa, Burkina Faso, Egypt, South Africa and Sudan are the adopters of GMOs (http://www.isaaa.org/resources/publications/default.asp). It has been estimated that, the adoption of GM corn, soybean and cotton by farmers has resulted in an increase in their availability at 10%, 20% and 18% respectively. These significant increments have been realized even with just a small number of countries growing GMOs. Instead of centering the debate on the real benefits of GMOs, opponents have rather chose to attack the profits being made by the companies developing GMOs so as to mislead the public. GMO adoption has even be more impactful in developing countries where the vast majority of farmers are impoverished and the success stories of these once highly impoverished farmers are well documented.

GMOs are labelled by opponents as man-made, hence are regarded as unnatural, and inherently unsafe for humans and the environment. These allegations are being made in contrast to the empirical data generated via more than 2000 studies that examined the health and environmental effects of GMOs but found no significant negative effects in comparison to organic and conventional foods. The National Academy of Science of USA, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the World Health Organization (WHO), the Royal Society of Medicine, among many other reputable independent science organizations have all cleared GMOs to be safe and sometimes safer and healthier.

With respect to GMOs being man-made and therefore considered by opponents to be unnatural, it is crucial to clarify the concept of that which is regarded as “natural” or “unnatural”. The concept of that which is regarded as “natural” is a very nebulous one. Nature consists of both living matter (including human beings) and non-living matter. The most basic usage of the term “unnatural” connotes a phenomenon or thing that exists only because of humankind, which gives one the impression that human beings are separate from nature in comparison to other living organisms like honey bees for instance. When the honey bee uses nature-available materials like pollen and nectar from plants to make honey for food, we regard that honey as “natural”, yet when human beings who equally share in nature like the honey bees make use of similar nature-available materials to produce stuffs suitable for our own use, we erroneously and absurdly tag them as “unnatural”. How different are human beings from honey bees within the framework of nature? What makes honey bee-made stuff to qualify as that which is “natural” and human-made stuff to be regarded as that which is “unnatural”? This is the absurdity in the classification of things deemed to be “natural” and “unnatural” by us.

All GMOs are not the same as opponents would want us to believe. Although the blanket term “GMO” is used to refer to all living organisms whose genomes have been modified through genetic engineering, GMOs, even for the same crop species differ from one another based on the trait modified or improved. They are designed either to address specific needs or different genetically modified traits could be stacked into one organism to address multiple needs. Each GMO should therefore be evaluated for acceptance based on the rationale behind its development. Those that we find useful and in sync with our national interest should be adopted. It is thus utterly unwise by opponents to lump all GMOs together and call for their outright ban.

GMOs continue to be demonized through scare tactics and horrendous images by opponents, and its advancement hangs in jeopardy by excessive regulation by governments. The technology is still in its infancy, and requires a lot of investment to develop new traits that will position humanity in winning the fight against hunger and extreme poverty in the glaring face of climate change and a mushrooming population. I, for one, believe in checks and balances in society that are geared towards protecting humanity's interests and the most vulnerable in our societies against over-exploitation by some unethical and unscrupulous persons or organizations. This could easily be done through the enactment of legislations, as has been done in other countries. That said, I want the debate on GMOs to be centered on a rational discourse borne out of a clear understanding of the technology, and the urgency for its adoption in Ghana, instead of basing it on sentiments, lies and unsubstantiated allegations. Common sense is what is urgently needed in the GMO debate presently, and I certainly hope we find it! The tools for forging a better tomorrow for the present and unborn generations are in our hands.

The choice is ours, but we stand to regret and become poorer if we do otherwise. As we debate, let’s not forget that climate change is real and the Malthusian population spell still hangs around humanity’s neck. While the fear of any new technology is understandable and expected, we must never allow these affluent anti-science environmentalists to prevent the vast majority of humanity from reaping the proven and real benefits of science. Readers who seek to have a good understanding of the technology for producing GMOs can look up for a previously published article titled: Genetic engineering in focus: understanding the tenets of the science for producing GMOs.

Alexander Wireko Kena
The author is a Doctoral student in Plant and Seed Molecular Biology at the South Dakota State University, Brookings, USA. He is also a faculty member of the Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, KNUST, Kumasi, Ghana. He holds a BSc. degree in Agriculture from KNUST, and MSc. degree in Crop Science (Plant Breeding option) from the University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria.