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| Limits to biotechnology | | Don't throw the technology away with the seeds |
| Business Standard / New Delhi Mar 11, 2010, 00:00 IST |
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The revelation by the developer of pest-protected Bt cotton Bollgard, Monsanto-Mahyco, that pink bollworm pest has developed resistance to the killer Bt gene, Cry1Ac, in parts of Gujarat, and the rebuttal of this by a government-funded cotton research institute have created a fresh, albeit avoidable, controversy around genetically modified (GM) crops. The Monsanto statement had claimed that during field monitoring of the 2009 cotton crop in Gujarat, the company’s scientists had detected unusual survival of pink bollworms on Bt cotton hybrid Bollgard in four districts — Amreli, Bhavnagar, Junagarh and Rajkot. The firm also said that this has been conveyed to the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), the apex GM regulator, following the principle of transparency and accountability. However, the director of the Central Institute for Cotton Research (CICR) of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has asserted that this conclusion is not well-founded as it is based on faulty testing methodology and has not been peer-reviewed. What lends a degree of credibility to the latter view is the fact that this institute has been involved in resistance-monitoring of Bt cotton since 2003 and its director heads the immunity-monitoring panel of the GEAC. Moreover, scientists of the Bt cotton developer firm are also members of this panel, which has neither noticed such resistance among pink bollworm nor reported any such development to the GEAC. Monsanto’s claim, on the other hand, is not necessarily well-founded because it is based on just one season’s observations when other factors, including weather, could have played a role in facilitating relatively higher survival of a particular pest.
One reason why the company’s view is suspect in the eyes of its critics is the feeling that it is seeking to create a market for a new, higher-priced seed. While Monsanto may have business reasons in mind, the fact also remains that its claims should be objectively verified and the farmers properly reassured of the factual position. After all, even GM crops are not immune to disease. Countless good crop varieties have in the past gone out of cultivation because of the loss of their inbuilt immunity against particular pests and diseases. Indeed, even in the case of human beings, pathogens and viruses inflicting them are known to often develop resistance against particular antibiotics, necessitating discovery of newer molecules to treat the diseases caused by them. The same is true in the case of vaccines and medicines used by humans to combat insect-borne diseases and other pandemics. Thus, there is no merit in denigrating new technologies per se. It would also be short sighted to altogether abandon modern biotechnology in the creation of new and better seeds and crop varieties. Be it Bt cotton or Bt brinjal, or any other GM crop, what is really required is that one be on guard all the time in the use of modern science and technology in the unending battle against pests and diseases. Scientists must continue to evolve new varieties of seeds with different kinds of resistance and periodically review them and replace older and outdated varieties or hybrids with superior ones.
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