China is currently setting up 20 agricultural technology demonstration centers in the developing world and plans to double the number of Chinese agricultural experts assigned to agricultural development projects in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
The major challenge is to significantly enhance crop productivity in the face of water scarcity, loss of fertile land and slowing agricultural productivity constrained by the law of diminishing returns, and slowing gains from successful past technologies. Therefore, despite all these formidable challenges, China is boldly investing in more collaborative programs designed to assist other developing countries in agriculture, stated International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA) in its Brief 42 released this year.
In the wake of growing food insecurity especially in Asia, China can serve as a model for other developing countries, particularly in the continent. This could have substantive implications for a more timely and efficient approval process for biotech crops in developing countries with new modes of South-South technology transfer and sharing, including public/public and public/private sector partnerships; more orderly international trade in rice and reduction in probability of recurrence of 2008-type price hikes, which were devastating for the poor; and shift of more authority and responsibility to developing countries to optimize ‘self-sufficiency’ and provide more incentive for their involvement to deliver their share of the 2015 Millennium Development Goals.
The brief further stated that the adoption of biotech, rice and maize in Asia will, in due course, greatly facilitate and expedite the approval and adoption of biotech wheat. The near-term food and feed needs of China, and more broadly Asia, are not limited to the major crop rice, but also apply to maize for feed, and also, more and better quality wheat for food.
Similarly, there are up to 50 million hectares of maize in Asia that could benefit from biotech maize, the Brief said, adding that China’s exertion of global leadership in approving biotech rice and maize in 2009 will result in a positive influence on acceptance and speed of adoption of biotech food and feed crops in Asia, and more generally globally, particularly in developing countries.
In China, it is very important to note that all three approved biotech crops Bt cotton, Bt rice, and phytase maize, were all developed with public resources by Chinese public sector institutions. The significant advantages that these products offer to China, also apply to other developing countries. Other Asian countries which could benefit from biotech maize include India with 8 million hectares, Indonesia with 3 million hectares and Thailand, Vietnam and Pakistan with approximately 1 million hectares of maize each.
It is to be noted that Asia grows and consumes 90 per cent of the production from the world’s 150 million hectares of rice, and Bt rice will have enormous impact in Asia. Not only can Bt rice contribute to an increase in productivity and self-sufficiency but it can also make a substantive contribution to the alleviation of poverty of poor small farmers who represent 50 per cent of the world’s poor, the Brief stated. Moreover, from a long term perspective, Bt rice and phytase maize should be seen as only the first of many agronomic and quality biotech traits to be integrated into improved biotech crops, with significant enhanced yield and quality. These can contribute to the doubling of food, feed, and fiber production with fewer resources, particularly water and nitrogen, by 2050. Whereas ISAAA has no knowledge of biotech rice being approved in any other country except China, the previous administration in Iran did temporarily officially release a Bt rice in 2004 to coincide with the celebration of the international rice year. The National Biosafety Council of Iran is now apparently reviewing the dossier on biotech rice as part of the process of approving and commercialisation of rice in Iran, the Brief added.
According to the Brief, China currently has 200 government funded biotechnology laboratories and 500 companies active in biotechnology.
