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The science and politics of plant biotechnology—a personal perspective

Nature Biotechnology volume 21, pages 849–851 (2003)Cite this article

The debate on the virtues and perils of biotechnology in the production of transgenic crops that started in 1983 has intensified and become quite contentious with the commercialization of transgenic foods in recent years. It has become political and emotional to the extent that it is now delaying and/or preventing the worldwide adoption of this important technology in addressing critical and urgent problems of food security and the environment. The following is my perspective on the science and politics of plant biotechnology.

Having considered all of the technologies known to us today, and the various arguments of the anti-biotechnology lobby, I remain more convinced than ever that plant biotechnology is still the best hope not only for meeting the food needs of the ever-growing human population, but also for conserving our precious but dwindling land and water resources and preventing or even reversing environmental degradation. Food production will have to be tripled to meet the demand for food of the nearly 12 billion expected inhabitants of the Earth in 20501,2, including the hundreds of millions of people in China and India whose dietary requirements are changing as a result of their improved buying power. The international agricultural community faces this challenge at a time when population is growing faster than increases in food productivity, when the quality and quantity of fresh water supplies are declining3, when there is less land per capita available for food production, when more than 42% of crop productivity is lost owing to various biotic/abiotic factors4, and when the widespread use of agro-chemicals is causing significant soil and water pollution (Table 1). The increasing demand for food, therefore, will have to be met primarily by increasing productivity on land already under cultivation, with less water and under worsening environmental conditions.

Table 1 Increasing population and declining resources
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Author notes

  1. This commentary is adapted from his presidential address to the 10 th Congress of the International Association for Plant Tissue Culture & Biotechnology (IAPTC&B), held June 23–28, 2002.

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  1. the University of Florida, Box 110690, Gainesville, 32611-0690, Florida, USA

    Indra K Vasil

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Vasil, I. The science and politics of plant biotechnology—a personal perspective. Nat Biotechnol 21, 849–851 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt0803-849

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