Certain types of rice rely on water to grow. Could biotechnology help rice farmers cope with water scarcity? Photo: Lionel Titu

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has published details on its e-mail conference discussing “Coping with water scarcity in developing countries: what role for agricultural biotechnologies?”

The 14th e-mail conference of the FAO Biotechnology Forum ran for four weeks between  March 5th and  April 1st 2007, under the umbrella of the FAO Working Group on Biotechnology.

The conference revealed a general consensus that biotechnology plays a ”valuable role” in addressing water scarcity in developing countries, although opinions differed on the value of different biotechnological approaches.  Contributors agreed that biotechnology had “not yet met [its] full potential to deliver practical solutions to the end-user in developing countries”, with the use of marker-assisted selection (MAS) and genetic modification prompting notable discussion.

Optimism surrounding the use of GM crops in developing countries to help manage drought faced a number of obstacles, including cost, complexity of traits, intellectual property rights issues and potential environmental impacts. C. S. Prakash, a contributor to the conference, noted that plant biotechnology presented a positive track-record for benefiting farmers in poor countries, with 90% of the growers using GM working in developing countries.

Richard Mundembe further highlighted the possible benefits of GM crops by referring to “resurrection plants”, which are able to tolerate near-total water loss and being modified to revive to full physiological activity once re-hydrated. He also voiced the hope that this would be a trait for possible development in a number of crops.

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Denis Murphy, however, felt that despite the hype surrounding the potential of GM crops, at present there existed a “limited knowledge of stress-associated metabolism in plants” constituting “a significant handicap to this in practice”.  Mr Murphy also voiced concern that problems for farmers in developing countries are often the result of a combination of different stresses that negatively impact crop performance, requiring analysts to adopt a “broader and more holistic approach” when introducing GM crops into the developing world.

The conference concluded that the successful development of drought- tolerant crops should not be the ultimate goal in itself, but instead focus on overcoming problems which may arise through the use of GM crops once developed, including reaching farmers. As Arun Shanker highlighted, the value of any genes or pathways for drought tolerance in crops could only be judged “by their eventual performance in the field”. Gian Nicolay added that the final aim should be the delivery of sustainable and accepted products and approaches, adding his belief that all relevant stakeholders should participate in plans for solutions.

In terms of contributing to development, Norbert Tchouaffé noted that community leaders, local authorities and non-government authorities had important roles to play in developing the technology, stressing the importance of including stakeholders and establishing partnerships between public and private sectors to develop solutions that would be not only “efficient and economically viable” but also “socially acceptable”.

The conference received 431 subscribers, 12% submitting at least one message. A total of 78 messages were received, 75% of which were posted by participants from developing countries. Contributions came from all major global regions, including Asia (47%), Africa (24%), Europe (18%) and North America (85%), as well as one message coming from both Latin America and the Caribbean and Oceania. Contributions came from 24 countries, including India, France, the US and Nigeria. 42% of messages came from people working in universities, 28% from research (including CGIAR centres), 8% from private companies or non-Governmental organisations, 6% from private consultants, 4% from government ministers and 4% from UN organisations and projects.

The background document to the conference can be found at http://www.fao.org/biotech/C14doc.htm. All posted messages are available at http://www.fao.org/biotech/logs/c14logs.htm

By Rebecca Debens

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