It's fifty years into the future and and our population has passed the 9 billion mark. Global warming has caused severe shortages of arable lands around the globe due to desertification and irrigation problems. Growing populations and migration to the north are putting existing forests under greater strain as societies look for more land to clear for farming. And, while the planet's land is surrounded by higher water levels, the supply of fresh water has been drastically reduced with most of it now being reserved for agricultural irrigation; in some nations, water for cleaning and bathing is unheard of. New diseases are attacking existing crops and organic solutions are harder to find. Oil is in short supply and must be rationed, which is easy enough as prices have made it a luxury item along with fresh fruits, vegetables and meat which are becoming scarcer due to their high irrigation demands.
But, perhaps the biggest issues facing society in fifty years will be the societal changes. Human migration has resulted in conflicts between natives and migrants around the globe. Food costs have skyrocketed and caused famine, rioting and civil wars. Farms and grocery stores employ security to protect their commodities, further increasing the costs. The world's richest nations are no longer the oil producers but, rather, the nations who can still produce food and water.
Will it really be this gloomy? I believe it will if we don't take drastic steps to change the course we are currently on. Organic farming, as much as I admire much of its elements, is simply not going to be able to feed more people on less land. We have seen that in the example of Cuba. It does not and will not provide better tasting food that is healthier. Studies continue to demonstrate that. And, it does not address the single most important issue facing agriculture in the next 50+ years: water. While their practices can help preserve and even reduce water use, organic crops still need irrigating. Add to that the required additional land simply for composting, the need for foods that can withstand long travel times (because, like it or not, locavores will become extinct or will be housing large numbers of migrants in their basements) and the constant threat of new diseases we have not even dreamed up yet and there is a recipe for catastrophe if we exclude science and engineering from the equation.
I would like to give you an example of organic farmers having to deal with threats to their very existence that could be helped by science:
Take the case of the subsistence farmers of Mizoram. These farmers rely on their annual crop of rice, corn and wheat which in good years feeds their families and provides enough excess for sale to acquire some of the "luxuries" of life - like a roof over their heads and clothes on their backs. For the most part, these farmers survive quite nicely as growing conditions are well suited for these crops and other grasses, such as bamboo. But every 50 years or so and a quirk of nature occurs that, if you are unlucky enough to be farming in Mizoram or most of southeast Asia, may result in starvation for you and your family.
Before I discuss that quirk let me sing the praises of the humble bamboo plant. Often called a super plant, there are over 1000 species of Bamboo ranging from simple ornamental to timber quality. It is ubiquitous in southeast Asia and is used for scaffolding, housing, fuel, food and utensils. It is a fast growing plant that was amongst the first plants found to regenerate after nuclear bombs were used. They have a rhizome root structure which makes them ideal for quick cultivation. And, they all fruit at exactly the same time every 48-50 years. Even if you took a seedling to a different continent it would come to fruit at the same time as the parent plant. A wonderful plant with innumerable uses all of which are renewable and sustainable.
The bad news, if you are a rice farmer in southeast Asia, is that the Black Rat knows all of this about the bamboo plant. It also knows that, gram for gram, bamboo fruit provides some of the best nutritional and energy of any plant. That is why the black rats have a breeding switch that becomes activated during the height of the bamboo flowering. Now, this would seem not a big deal except that the qualities black rats are best known for are rapid breeding and ferocious appetites. They can and will eat anything that grows and every fifty years that means bamboo fruit. Normally the level of food availability keeps the rat population in check as females will breed less and even resort to eating their offspring when food supplies are low. But the fruiting of bamboo is so great that it jumpstarts the breeding of the females who have a 21 day gestation period and a weening period of just 2 weeks. An average female can pump out 200 offspring per year with half of them females ready to breed themselves in less than a couple of months.
Researchers have identified that the breeding cycle during the fruiting season comes in 4 pulses with the first coming at the first sign of bamboo flowers. Each pulse denotes an additional generation of breeding females being added to the existing generation. By the fourth pulse their numbers are astronomical and this comes when most of the fruit is already gone. With their preferred food supply exhausted, the rats turn their voracious appetite to the wheat, corn and rice crops which have yet to ripen. The rats can strip a field clean in less than a night, and if it is your field they strip, you can expect a lean winter.
But, researchers have also found that when a rice, wheat or corn field is ready for harvest before that fourth pulse, the farmers can get their harvest in and the rats simply return to their cannibalistic ways. So, what if science could engineer rice, wheat and corn plants that grew faster and were ready to harvest weeks earlier rather than synced with the bamboo fruit? Shouldn't they, if it means staving off starvation for hundreds of thousands? This threat is not limited to Mizoram, as the same phenomenon is present throughout Vietnam, Cambodia and most of southeast Asia. Black rats have also been implicated in the spread of the Black Plague around the globe, so keeping their numbers in check might be beneficial to everyone.
But, I hear you yelling at your screen right now "oh Dennis, what about frankenfoods, broccoli with eyes and tomatoes with still beating pigs' hearts?' Let me put your addle mind at ease. They don't and wouldn't exist! Genetic modification is occurring at the level of DNA, which is identical in cells across species, it is not directly manipulating chromosomes for combining with another species' chromosome. Our human superiority complex doesn't like to admit that we are no different a life form than any other life form, but we aren't. Our DNA is exactly the same as that of a cockroach. All that is different is how they combine to form bases and chromosomes. When we find a cell that shows a preferred trait we can examine the DNA and identify how that DNA is expressed and use that expression in a cell of another species' chromosome to create the same trait in that species. If we took the DNA expression for blue eyes out of a human cell and put it into a tomato cell, the tomato would not have blue eyes because tomatoes don't have eyes. It's not in their chromosomes. However, it might cause something else to turn blue for all I know, which would seem a pretty cool experiment from my perspective, but I digress. Theoretically, yes, we could manipulate the DNA in just about anything to, with enough time, create a human from a tomato, but at that point it would no longer be a tomato and you probably wouldn't want to eat it.
Genetic modification is not an invention of the modern world, but has been practiced since the beginning of agriculture. Selecting the genetic traits that we prefer has been something humans have done with vegetation as well as domesticated pets and farm animals. If you enjoy broccoli, cauliflower, zucchini, carrots or nearly any produce you buy at the grocery store - organic or otherwise - you enjoy genetically modified foods. All of those foods have had their genes manipulated through natural mutations which someone identified as preferential. For proof of this look at your dog, then look at your neighbour's dog. Advances in technology have simply allowed us to accomplish this in the lab much quicker.
In addition, GMO foods are regulated. Heavily. And they must demonstrate that they are safe to consume as well as safe to grow. Organic produce, on the other hand, is not regulated. To date, not one instance of human illness has been associated with GMO products despite being in production since the seventies. The same can not be said for organic produce.
But, most importantly, GMO crops are saving lives! Both Norman Borlaug and Pamela Ronald have demonstrated that science can provide answers to many of the problems facing a growing population without resorting to the natural and organic practices of the Black Rat.
If there is one knock against science that I am willing to concede it would be in the area of chemical pesticides. But, even in this concession I have my reservations. As with antibiotic use in farm animals, I believe the true issue with chemical pesticides and chemical fertilizers has more to do with avarice and hubris than science. Science can only help answer questions, it can not regulate human behavior. Our desire to make as much money off as little investment as possible, and the arrogance of thinking we know better than anyone else combine to turn decent technologies into the environmental hazards many chemicals have become. But, when used only when needed I believe these technologies can ensure safe, high yield, sustainable harvests for generations. I also do not think that the organic movement is any less avaricious or hubristic. This is human nature regardless of your calling in life. I know from my own experience that asking a farmer if his products are organic, sustainable and local is no more of a guarantee than asking the 16 year old produce clerk at Loblaws.
When we look at the most destructive technologies that have been introduced to society - lead in vehicles, CFC's in aerosols and refrigeration, DDT in pesticides - we see scientists at the forefront of exposing the damage those technologies have caused. Science is an all encompassing discipline which includes the study of our environment. It should not surprise anyone to see scientists working for activist organizations come from the same classrooms as those working for oil companies anymore than it would surprise them to find two Catholics at opposing sides. So, for me, science must have an equal role in the production and distribution of a sustainable food supply as does the organic movement. In my next post I will discuss how I think they can.
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