The Genetics Controversy - Agri-culture: Reconnecting People, Land and Nature - page 143

apomixies trait, would be a great benefit for poor farmers. However, unless
this technology is cheap, it is unlikely to be accessible to the very people
who need it most.
As indicated elsewhere in this topic, sustainable agriculture is now an
increasingly viable option for many farmers in developing and industrialized
countries alike. But where there are no alternatives to specific problems,
then genetic modification could bring forth novel and effective options.
If research is conducted by public-interest bodies, such as universities,
non-governmental organizations and governments themselves, whose
concern it is to produce public goods , then biotechnology could result in the
spread of technologies that have immense benefits. Research that is likely
to bring new options for farmers already includes studies on virus-resistant
cassava, potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice and maize, nematode-resistant
bananas, thermo-tolerant and drought-tolerant pearl millet, Striga -resistant
maize, and pest-resistant wheat. 35
One good example is rice yellow-mottle virus, which is a major factor
in limiting African rice production, often reducing yields by 50-95 per
cent. 36 It has not been possible to introduce resistance into local varieties
through conventional breeding; but genetic modification has led to the
development of novel resistant varieties. These have been tested in five
countries, resulting in complete resistance to the virus. Another example
is tolerance to salinity, which affects 340 million hectares of land
worldwide. Some plants are known to produce and accumulate osmo-
protectant solutes, such as glycinebetamine, mannitol, trehalose and
proline. These non-toxic solutes can accumulate to osmotically significant
levels in order to protect against damage from high salt concentrations
in the soil. Introduction of single genes has led to modest accumulations
of solutes, However, to be successful, multiple-genes coding for entirely
new metabolic pathways will be needed.
Further applications could improve yields in developing countries
if they remove or tolerate a stress, such as rice that tolerates prolonged
submergence, and if they allow cultivation of problem soils, such as those
affected by aluminium toxicity. 37 Nonetheless, new threats to the liveli-
hoods of developing country farmers may yet arise. Transgenic tropical
crops, such as sugar cane, oil palm, coconut, vanilla and cocoa, could be
grown in temperate countries with appropriate genetic modification.
Other crops may be engineered to replace tropical products. Oilseed rape,
for example, could be engineered to produce lauric acid for soap-making,
thereby threatening producers of oil palm in Malaysia and Ghana.