Can GM solve the food crisis?
Giving everyone access to food will become more and more difficult, as the world’s population is expected to grow to 9 billion by 2050. Image: Klaas Lingbeek-van Kranen/iStockphoto
The world is facing a food crisis. In the UK we see the effects of extreme weather and high transport costs reflected in our rising shopping bills. For many around the world the situation is far bleaker. Finding enough food for a family is a daily struggle.
And current problems are set to worsen in the future. Climate change and a growing population hungry for more food, particularly meat, will put extra pressure on land and food supplies.
Could GM increase crop yields in the future and help avert the food crisis?
Does GM technology increase yield?
GM crops were not initially designed to increase yields.
It's a simple question... but the answer is more complex.
It depends how you measure yield. The GM crops we have at the moment were designed to help farmers manage insect pests and weeds. By reducing the amount of crop farmers lose to pests, GM means they have more to harvest.
But these GM crops were not designed to make plants grow bigger, or grow more intensively, so in this sense they do not increase yield – nor would we expect them to.
It's a gamble
Scientists are now trying to increase yields using GM technology – for example by making corn with bigger ears.
GM scientists are now working on increasing crop yields. But the new plants aren't available yet, so we can't know how they will perform in farmers' fields.
Some studies show that current GM crops have increased the size of harvests. Others suggest they haven't, and in some cases yields have even decreased. It depends on the crop, the region, the conditions and the farming practices used.
GM critics say GM crop yields fall after a few years anyway as insects become resistant. They claim selective breeding methods are a more reliable way of increasing harvests for longer.
What about small farmers?
A wheat farmer in Pakistan. Image: CIMMYT
The current generation of GM crops are designed to benefit farmers with large, industrial farms that provide much of the food in Europe and America. But this isn't where the biggest challenges lie.
In many developing countries, families feed themselves by farming small plots of land. When droughts, floods, plant pests or diseases destroy harvests on these small farms, many families end up without enough food to eat.
What benefit could GM have for small farmers like these?
GM'll fix it
A field trial of insect-resistant maize in Kenya. Image: Dave Hoisington/CIMMYT
GM supporters claim that genetic modification could play an important role in developing countries. Crops modified to withstand attacks of pests or diseases, or environmental changes such as drought, could prevent small farmers losing their harvests.
In addition, farmers need only buy new GM seeds each year, but can continue farming just as before. So some argue it is easy to get GM technology to the people that need it. By comparison, teaching new techniques to farmers in remote, rural areas is much more difficult.
No silver bullet
Fifty-seven countries have approved the findings of the IAASTD report. Image: Emrah Turudu/iStockphoto
However, a major 2008 report was lukewarm about the role GM crops had to play in the developing world.
The IAASTD report was written by 400 international experts from governments, universities, research institutes and private companies. While it did not reject GM technology, the authors felt there were too many problems for GM crops to be of real benefit now. They were concerned the technology was not regulated enough in many countries to ensure its safety. The authors said local knowledge and methods already used by farmers were more valuable than GM – and less risky.
Consumer choice
We found two products containing GM ingredients on sale in the UK.
The report also stressed the importance of people's choice of food. Though modified crops might offer better nutrition or improved yields, varieties are regularly rejected if they differ in colour or flavour from familiar varieties.
In Europe we choose from a huge range of food in our shops. In the 1990s people chose to avoid GM food, and supermarkets removed it from their shelves. It is now difficult to buy products with GM ingredients in European supermarkets.
But what we put in our trolleys has an effect much further afield.
Worldwide impact
Wilberforce Tushemereirwe of the National Agricultural Research Organisation (Uganda) describes the impact on Africa of Europe's rejection of GM food. Source: Horizon © BBC Productions
Most countries in Africa and Asia grow little GM food. This is because they export much of their harvests to Europe. As Europe has largely rejected GM food, other countries can't make money from selling it to us.
GM supporters argue Europe's rejection of GM is preventing thousands of farmers worldwide from using a technology that could boost both their yields and their profits when food supplies are in crisis.
Critics are concerned that using the food crisis to put GM back on the agenda distracts from other, more effective solutions.