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The Green Revolution, Again
Imagine a future where we have rice plants that grew during droughts and wheat that flourishes in freezing temperatures?
Wait, before we talk about the future, let’s take a quick look at the past. In 1970, Norman Borlaug accepted a Nobel Prize Laureate for Peace for his work in creating the Green Revolution. The Green Revolution used improved varieties of high-yielding wheat and rice and coupled them with modern farming techniques. The result? It boosted rice and wheat production more than threefold in Asia between 1961 and 2001 while using only slightly more land. It is credited with saving the lives of up to 1 billion people!
Could another innovation like that help tackle the weather issues of today? Borlaug thinks so. He says what the Green Revolution did for the second half of the 20th century, the gene revolution could do for the 21st century. That’s right. Biotechnology is our greatest hope to halt the world’s current food crisis.
How Does It Work?
For centuries, humans have been breeding plants and livestock to produce tastier, more nutritious, and more abundant food. Biotechnology does the same thing. It is genetic engineering. In simple terms, biotechnology takes traits from one gene and splice them with another. It is the same basic concept as cross-breeding, but it is done in a lab so that it is more precise and allows for more possibilities.
Is it Safe?
Yes! We Americans have been eating biotech foods for more than a decade, such as seedless grapes and papayas. And
why not? Biotech products have been declared safe and nutritious by leaders of respected national and international organizations such as:
- American Medical Association
- American Dietetic Association
- Institute of Food Technologists
- World Health Organization
- Food and Agricultural Organizations of the United Nations
As former president Jimmy Carter says, “Responsible biotechnology is not the enemy; starvation is.” That’s why many countries in Europe and Asia, who have opposed biotechnology in the past, are now diving deep into the topic. They understand that biotechnology can lift the world from it’s food crisis and higher food prices.
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