Sir

In his review of my book The Doubly Green Revolution1, N. W. Simmonds asserts that biotechnology's “plant breeding achievements so far are nil”. This is simply not true. Even the average supermarket shopper is aware that the products of genetically engineered crops are on the shelves. Last year, more than 20 million acres of such crops were harvested in the United States, and there have been some significant achievements in developing countries2.

Tissue-culture techniques in China and South Korea have produced several new rice varieties; one, La Fen Rockefeller, is giving up to 25% higher yields. Transgenic rices are now available incorporating resistance to insects, bacterial blight, rice stripe virus and hoja blanca virus. Molecular markers have been used to incorporate multiple resistance genes in rice in China, India and Colombia. None of this would have been possible without biotechnology.