Please find below a representative sampling of submissions from May - July, 2000. Some submissions have been edited for length. Only those submissions which were not accompanied by a name, location, and valid e-mail address have been omitted.

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Producing artificial seeds with added nutrients does provide a profititious food but intermingling with the natural process of evolution can in long term turn out to be an abnormal mutation in species as till date the genome mystery is not totally revealed. So a slight mistake can result into a big blunder tomorrow.

Abhi
India
a_bhatnagar@hotmail.com

I think GM plants are better than the existing ones. With GM plants resistant to insects and diseases we can control environmental pollution caused by the pesticides and save our environment.

Bhupesh Vaid
India
bhupesh.vaid@usa.net

Certain aspect of biotechnology can help. I feel genes for climatic tolerance can be the best help, because it is easier to fight a static condition like the abiotic factor, than a dynamic world of insects and diseases which will quickly adapt to any introduced toxin. Thanks.

Partho
Manila
p_dhang@hotmail.com

Yes! That's very true. Biotech can definitely help in all these food problems. If 1950-60 was the age of physics & other related science fields, then surely the coming century will be the age of biotech.

Pooja Gupta
USA
guptapooja_76@hotmail.com

Yes, I do believe that biotechnology is the ultimate option for the future. I am from Kalahandi, which made headlines in all national newspapers about the starvation death. Now a lot of areas are irrigated, but the problem is always there is a new infection to the rice plant, due to which the farmers in my locality lose from 20 to 70% of their yield. So my belief is to fight across these infections, diseases and to achieve high yield biotechnology is the in thing.

Arun Nanda
Badatemari, Kalahandi, Orissa, India
arunnanda@hotmail.com

As a biotechnologist, I consider biotechnology will certainly play a major role in sustainable agriculture. Genetically modified food may be costly in the developing world. They may not be able to support genetic engineering programmes. As a result they will become dependent on multinational companies. Alternative approach is Radiation induced mutations for crop improvement. FAO/IAEA database shows over 2000 mutant cultivars have been developed in several countries, including China and India. Tissue culture and radiation induced mutations can be combined with conventional breeding for developing new cultivars. The developing countries should not put all their eggs in one basket. They should choose the cost effective technology for crop improvement. At FAO/IAEA joint division, we are trying to promote radiation induced mutations, tissue culture and breeding for crop improvement in the developing countries.

Mohan Jain
Austria
S.M.Jain@iaea.org

"We have helped feed the world using breakthroughs such as the production of higher yielding wheat, rice, corn and potatoes. This has been done by treating agricultural technology advances as a benefit to be shared as widely as possible, including with poor farmers in developing countries." M.S. Swaminanthan. If technology, genes and genomes cannot be shared freely, then biotechnology will not help to feed the millions. Biotechnology is not a replacement of conventional breeding but only a complementary technology. Combining whole plant genomes still holds a vast potential and will stay as an important component of breeding new varieties. Developing countries must continue to invest in plant breeding programs. The international institutions must continue to provide them free access to plant genetic resources and low cost biotechniques.

B.S. Ahloowalia
Agric. Food Developemnt Authority, Dublin, Ireland
bahloowalia@kinsealy.teagasc.ie

To meet the food requirements of our growing population, India has to produce an additional 5-6 million tonnes of food grains annually from the same area under crops or even lesser area. High yielding varieties of rice and wheat developed by traditional means already cover nearly 75 and 90 % of the cropped area, respectively. These situations extend support for utilising every other openings available for augmenting our agricultural production.

The extensive and intensive public debate for and against the use of biotechnology in crop improvement programmes has created a confused/wrong impression that it is of a dangerous and an unworthy technology in the minds of common people. Biotechnology does not always result in the development of GMOs that invite criticisms these days. Biotechnological tools can be used in several ways in conjunction with the conventional methods for enhancing their speed and precision. Though these approaches may not be as fast as producing a GMO via the transgenic path, we would be lamenting for their non-utility in future, if we ignore them now. For example, they would be of great value for expanding our knowledge on the populations of the devastating insect pests and disease causing organisms, an information basically essential for identifying useful pest resistance genes for deployment in target locations and for the selection of appropriate genotypes carrying the gene(s) of our interest!

We should start employing biotechnology in every agricultural research and development programmes wherever feasible and start exploiting the available opportunities including utilisation of GMOs that might necessitate clearing the concerns and doubts raised scientifically for a secure food supply to our growing population.

Dr. R. Sridhar
Central Rice Research Institute, Cuttack
rangsridhar@dte.vsnl.net.in

It is important to realise that a true scientist should always look at both sides of the coin. Lack of information about the larger issues should not prompt us to act by whatever our salary-payers are asking us to.

Sastry Rama
Bangalore
rsastry@hotmail.com

Biotechnology holds the key to increase productivity.Genomic potentials yet harnessed to the minimum extent by mankind. Very soon surprises are expected from developments in stress resistant plants. Salt and frost resistant plants may appear soon . That will show possibilities of utilizing several million acres of presently non-cultivable land cultivable.Societal confidence must increase however to accept this very useful technology. Educating all levels of people is very important and crucial however.

P. K. Ghosh
Delhi
prasanta@nic.in

Yes. With proper focus on development of high yielding seeds and plant variants, biotechnology can contribute to substantial increase in both quantity and quality of food production in India.

Balakrishnan
Cochin
balakrishnan@spectrum.net.in

We have witnessed the success of Green Revolution. Thus biotechnology also should be a success story. As the IT boom has done wonders to the world by way of job opportunities, new companies, etc., the same scenario will be seen for biotechnology. With India crossing the 1 billion mark recently, we definitely look at biotech with a stronger and newer perspective. It's definitely one of the solutions to meet our growing billions.

Roshni
India
Roshni_4@yahoo.com

We appreciate the strides achieved by the ongoing research in biotechnology and its promises to meet food for billions. Concerns, however, stay as even US FAO officials too acknowledge "potential risks" from GMOs to human health and the environment. Even European Union has called for setting up an international scientific panel to look at the GMOs in grain, feed, and other foodstuffs. Clarifications on these issues will help.

Sharad Mistry
Mumbai, India
sharadmistry@express2.indexp.co.in

As in 1940, it was not possible to feed booming population just by using traditional types of agricultural practices, and we adopted Pesticide, herbicide, etc. Same problem is existing now. When we are moving to have more & more population and less & less land, just think how it is possible to feed this population without going for agricultural practices which would yield more. Biotechnology shows a ray of hope. Let's follow it and take advantage of this technology to feed our burgeoning population.

Vivekanand Sharma
Mumbai
vivekanand_sharma@hotmail.com