With the approval of DMH -11, has the dawn finally arrived for GMOs?

 

The mind always instinctively fears the unknown. And it is not always a bad thing. It is an innate biological response before our brain comes up with a solution to deal with the unknown. Scientific discoveries have always been bringing spotlights to the unknowns. Hence it is inevitable that most people see these unknowns sceptically. But my point here is that scepticism should not turn into blind cynicism. When we hear words like corporates, science and profit, our mind automatically associates them with evil. And it is not particularly astonishing because new frontiers of science have always been born out of controversies. But why do people arrive at immediate conclusions without thinking twice?

According to Daniel Kahneman's theory, our brain has two operating systems - System 1 and System 2. System 1 is fast and unconscious, automatic, and effortless. It does not have self-awareness or control and adheres to the dictum: What you see is all there is. Whereas System 2 is slow and deliberate. The brain is self-aware, logical and sceptical when the OS is system 2. It takes conscious effort to identify missing pieces when a piece of information is processed and strives hard to make informed decisions. 

 

This detour towards psychology is necessary to explain why we develop fancy theories and ideas over things on which we possess no competence.

Nuclear energy and Genetics are a few examples that come to my mind, which have always been on the receiving end of such cynicism. If we take the Indian nuclear energy program, it is time to reflect on how badly we have fared here. Nuclear power contributes a meagre 1.7% of installed power generation capacity. When it comes to Nuclear energy, people immediately tend to think of Chornobyl and Fukushima disasters. While these are not pleasant visuals, these visuals dictate the way how people perceive nuclear power, not facts. Coal dominates when it comes to power production. Here is a statistic which says that Coal has the highest mortality per thousand terawatt hour of power generated. Countless pieces of evidence support the fact that nuclear energy is much more benign when compared to fossil energy. 

Except for the mindless activism during the installation of the Kudankulam Nuclear power plant, Indians have not bought into this bullshit. So the blame squarely lies on the Indian government. We will talk about this later in a separate blog. 

But GMOs have not escaped our cynicism. It might be shocking for some readers to find that Bt Brinjal, an indigenously developed genetically modified crop, despite approval from the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee, was subjected to a ban by the environment ministry due to unfounded fears. Bt Brinjal is also successfully commercialized in Bangladesh. 

It is not to say that anti-GMO proponents argue without reason. The leading genetics research company Monsanto (now acquired by Bayer) is indeed known more for its controversies than its research. But because a corporate is tainted, one should not scandalize the science.  

The reason I am championing GMOs is not because of my love for reason and science. For a nation to exert sovereignty, it must ensure food security. Joe Studwell explains how Latin America's misplaced priority on manufacturing over agriculture resulted in the depletion of forex reserves as they imported more essential food items. GMO plant varieties could vastly increase per-hectare productivity and reduce our import dependence. 

It is indeed laudable to note that independent India has not faced famine. But it has flirted with it during the late 60s. Many of you will remember the iron-willed Lal Bahadur Shashtri asking his fellow Indians to sacrifice one meal a day. India relied on wheat supplies from the United States under Public Law 480 (PL-480). At one point, they suspended wheat exports to our country, and our foreign reserves were dangerously depleting, forcing us to import High Yield Variety seeds from Mexico - ergo, the Green revolution. 

The Green revolution was successful in many ways. The political leaders understood the need for self-sufficiency in essential food items. C. Subramaniam, the then minister of agriculture, steered the political debate to import HYV seeds in the mid-1960s despite opposition in the Parliament. Read this piece by Ashok Gulati to know what we have achieved because of Green Revolution. 

We had witnessed a Seldon crisis back in the 60s. We are about to face another near time in the future. Consider, for instance, cooking oil. India is the biggest importer of edible oils, and last year, it spent nearly $19 billion importing vegetable oils, including palm and sunflowers oils. India fills more than 70% of its edible oil demand from Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia, Malaysia, Russia and Ukraine. With the Russia - Ukraine war never coming to a ceasefire, the situation might get only worse. 

GM mustard can help the country reduce import dependency in this area. This article explains the science of GM Mustard in a better way. Mustards are naturally self-pollinating but have to cross-pollinate to create more hybrid varieties. The Genetic application ensures that one of the plants is male-sterile to enable cross-pollination. In simple words, we are harnessing genetics to create more hybrids of mustard. 

There is a lot to learn from the first Seldon(agricultural) crisis. Its success heavily relied on assuaging farmers' concerns about using HYV seeds which were alien to them at that time as GMO seeds. The Minimum Support Price concept was mooted during the mid-60s to nudge the farmers to use HYVs. All these would not have happened without a political conviction and a genuine desire towards food security. Do we have to wait for a crisis to collect our act together? Can't we be proactive? Can't we have an informed debate over the science of genetics? 

I am optimistic about our countrymen and the political process!