GM Food

New technologies play an increasing role in food production, and genetically modified foods (GMF) are at the forefront of the changing nature of our food culture. The promise of GMFs seems almost too good to be true. With a human population of more 6 billion, producing higher yielding foods may be more crucial than ever. Genetically modified (GM) crops are now grown in more than 16 countries. In 2002, farmers around the world planted 60 million hectares of land with dozens of varieties of GM crops. The appearance of GMFs in the marketplace of the West has resulted in a firestorm of public debate, scientific discussion, and media coverage. A variety of ecological and human health concerns come with the new advances made possible by GM.

GM is the technique of changing or inserting genes. Genes carry the instructions for all the characteristics that an organism – a living thing – inherits. They are made up of DNA. GM is done either by altering DNA or by introducing genetic material from one organism into another, which can be either a different variety of the same or a different species. For example, genes can be introduced from one plant to another plant, from a plant to an animal, or from an animal to a plant. Transferring genes between plants and animals is a particular area of controversy. Developing countries have special interests, but fairer trade rules would do more to eliminate hunger than GM crops.

GM foods offer a way to quickly improve crop characteristics such as yield, pest resistance, or herbicide tolerance, often to a degree not possible with traditional methods. Further, GM crops can be manipulated to produce completely artificial substances, from the precursors to plastics to consumable vaccines.

By manipulating the genetic code of organisms that provide food sources, they have created new strains of plants and animals capable of growing larger in less time on less suitable soil. From an ecological perspective, adding more food to a starving population promotes reproduction, exacerbating the very condition scientists are trying to solve.

The policymakers of Pakistan ought to see how GM technology can help produce more food and offer medical, social and economic benefits but without attached threats. Some of the many health advantages of GMF include the edible vaccines, which can help curb various diseases in Pakistan. Nutritionally improved crops with a higher content of proteins and vitamins can supplement the nutritional requirements of the lower strata of the population, who cannot afford a non-vegetarian diet. Pulses constitute a major source of protein in Pakistan. However, the presence of raffinose-like sugars can cause digestive problems. The genetically tailored pulses that contain reduced amounts of raffinose and similar sugars can result in enhanced digestibility. GMF that contain sweet proteins like thaumatin will be good for people with diabetes. And GMFs that have greater iron content can be especially beneficial for Pakistani women, as they are susceptible to anemia.

GM crops can result in enhanced agricultural productivity with lower inputs in terms of plant protection strategies and fertilizer applications, raise the per capita income and, hence, the living standard. Further, the availability of better quality nutrition at affordable costs can also improve the general health of the population, which in turn will raise national productivity.

Contrary to the natty payback, many leading scientists admit that GM is unpredictable, unstable, and potentially dangerous because of the consequences. GMF raises the possibility of human health, environmental, and economic problems, including unanticipated allergic responses to novel substances in foods, the spread of pest resistance or herbicide tolerance to wild plants, inadvertent toxicity to benign wildlife, and increasing control of agriculture by biotechnology corporations.
In Pakistan it will be a tragedy if the multinational corporations pushing genetically engineered crops gain control over crops and seeds. Although the corporations claim biotechnology is needed to feed the world, this is a myth. There is already more than enough food to feed everyone; poverty and inadequate allocation of resources are the major hurdles. According to a FAO report, the world can produce enough food to meet global demand in the year 2030 without the use of GM crops.
Meanwhile, organic farmers are among those most threatened by GMF. One reason is because cultivation of genetically engineered crops on neighboring farms can contaminate their crops via pollen drift. No genetically engineered materials should be used in organic products. Thus, a grower may be unable to sell his or her crop as organic if it has been contaminated
Ultimately, it is the consumer--and all Earth's inhabitants--who have the most to lose in the long run. Because little thought is being given to the consequences of what GM crops will do to the environment and to biodiversity, Earth's ecosystem could be turned upside down. There will be no way to undo the damage or recall new organisms that have been unleashed.
Large seed companies are likely to make large profits from GM crop seeds. This will be exacerbated if they make crops that produce sterile seeds, which cannot be replanted the following year. Consumers and small farmers who are forced to buy seed year after year will lose.
Pakistan needs to adopt a harmonized, uniform and transparent procedure for safety assessment of GMF. Coordinated and comprehensive labeling requirements for GMF should also be prepared with the aim of providing the consumer with a real choice.
Pakistan has a national food poverty rate of 33% and 40% of children under the age of five are underweight, 50% are stunted, and 9% are wasted. The GMF has the capability of overcoming these problems. Its dubious impact, nevertheless, compels us to seriously consider all pros and cons before the risks involved in GMF take the nation by surprise. Asif J. Mir, Organizational Transformation

A Dehydrated Future is coming

Water resources are declining and different UN reports confirm that serious shortages are occurring soon. Thus we see a future when there will be no or less drinking water.

Access to water is a human right. Current declarations on human rights include basic water needs sufficiently. Basic water rights focus only on water for domestic use, and speak only of amounts of the order of 30-50 liters per person per day. Nonetheless, for many poor people, access to water for productive purposes is a crucial basic need as well. This is because water is a key factor of production in agriculture and for most other forms of economic activity that are vital to the livelihoods and opportunities of the poor.

Some question the wisdom of providing water of drinking quality at great expense, only to have a large share flushed down toilets, to carry waste, where after it is cleaned again for the few that can afford this costly practice. Opinions differ: some water experts advocate ecological sanitation, others dry toilets, some people argue that only bottled water should be of drinking quality and piped water quality should be limited to fit all other use made of it. All these alternative approaches deserve more attention.

Water infrastructure of Pakistan is turning into archaic. Reservoirs are silting up irrigation networks and turning disrepair. Groundwater levels are falling in important aquifers that have contributed substantially to food security in recent years by providing water-on-demand to millions of farmers that tapped them using tube-wells to grow their crops. This situation has impacted adversely causing a serious scarcity of water resources. This scarcity has hit the poor and vulnerable-first and hardest.

Pakistan’s per capita water availability in 1951 was 5,650 which has fallen to around 1,200 cubic meters 1,200 and with current population growth rate, it will be reduced to 1,000 cubic meters by the year 2012. So the hard reality that we as people faced today is that Pakistan in the past fifty years has turned into a water-scarce from a water-sufficient country and the situation continues to go downhill. This is the specimen of a mismanaged case.

Pakistan is the victim of repeated wrong planning of its land and water resources to produce food. All this is due to the pathetic and inert attitude of the technocrats, bureaucrats, politicians and the government as no national policy on water development was framed.

Large-scale development of river and groundwater resources is less acceptable today, for environmental reasons. It is also less cost effective than it was in the 1960-1990 period, when the large majority of the world's 45,000 large dams were built.

Water can be distributed through government institutions or the market. Privatization of water service provision, however, does not imply privatization of water resources. Water is a public good, which should be treated as an economic good where it is used for economic purposes. The public-private sector role nevertheless does not imply the role of multinational companies but the role and significance of the small-scale private sector.

In agriculture, private farmers have been largely responsible for the major investments in groundwater development. This groundwater use has contributed significantly to food production and the creation of wealth in rural areas. But government has failed to elaborate rules and mechanism ensuring that groundwater is used in a way that minimizes the risks of over-use and protects groundwater quality.

Increasing the efficiency in irrigated agriculture can result in large water savings. The UN Secretary General once rightly uttered: We need a Blue Revolution in agriculture that focuses on increasing productivity per unit of water. Indeed, at the farm level, the focus on water productivity in physical terms, crop output per unit of water, is a necessary and useful framework. Likewise, appropriate soil fertility and plant nutrition management can be a way to achieve more crops per unit of water. Water productivity at the basin level must be defined to include crop, livestock and fishery yields, wider ecosystem services and social impacts such as health, together with the systems of resource governance that ensure equitable distribution of these benefits.

For sustainable development, it is clear that better water management should be a means to reduce poverty. Strategies to address water-poverty relationships need to improve the different capabilities of the poor in their battle against poverty. These strategies also need to address the pervasive gender issues in water. Those affected by water problems are too often women, while those deciding on solutions tend to be men. Building gender-equitable capabilities of the poor to manage their water resources should also be at the heart of capacity building in the water sector.

The Provinces should formulate a water supply master plan and continuous planning process to estimate demand for drinking water and identify alternative ways of meeting that demand.

They should also establish and allocate resources to local governments for the preparation of provincial-mandated water supply plans. The Provinces should also enact legislation requiring local governments to formulate and administer comprehensive watershed protection programs in designated future water supply watersheds.

A system needs also to be evolved to promote the adoption of best management practices to minimize agricultural erosion in designated future water supply watersheds by funding and extending existing state cost-sharing programs to those watersheds and by targeting federal, state, and local technical assistance programs to them. A framework also has to be in place to increase technical assistance to local governments to help them prepare and administer watershed protection programs for designated future drinking water sources.

In evaluating alternatives for conjunctive use, water managers should also view ground water as more than a supplement to surface supplies. In particular, managers should assess the value of ground water in optimizing storage capacity, enhancing transmission capabilities, and improving water quality of the system. Asif J. Mir Organizational Transformation