The St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Monsanto Cites Support For Biotechnology As Best Solution For World Hunger

True or false? More than 18 million people died of hunger last year; some 800 million are hungry this very moment.

The land used for the world's food production must increase its productivity by at least 60 percent in the next 25 years.

Current methods of farming are highly reliant on chemical and other inputs that may threaten the environment.

Real global prosperity cannot be achieved unless hunger is eliminated.

Agricultural biotechnology has improved yields and helped reduce pesticide use for hundreds of thousands of farmers in the United States and abroad.

All are true.

Yet when cited by Monsanto and other companies as reasons for developing and promoting agricultural biotechnology, many dismiss the facts as corporate propaganda. Regardless of the source, the truth is still the truth.

Government regulators, scientists, farmers, non-governmental organizations, nutritionists, doctors, cancer researchers even former presidents agree that biotechnology will be a critical component in solving many of the world's problems like hunger, poverty and pollution. Though not loud or extreme, they deserve to be heard.

For example, former President Jimmy Carter, one of the world's foremost leaders in the fight against hunger and poverty says: "There is no greater challenge ahead than to feed the world's population and ensure the health of our children - and to accomplish that without further degradation of the earth that sustains us.... Science and technology must lead the way in helping farmers grow more food without additional destruction of wetlands, rainforests and wilderness areas."

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization support biotechnology as well as the development of safety criteria. "Biotechnology provides new and powerful tools for research and accelerating the development of new and better foods," they noted in their joint report.

The World Bank sees agricultural biotechnology as an important component in alleviating world hunger by increasing agricultural productivity in the developing world and encouraging the transition to sustainable methods. The World Bank is on record as favoring "more support for the developing world's agricultural science community," "more high-quality research in biotechnology," and "the implementation of national biosafety regulatory structures."

The Institute of Food Technologists has declared: "Genetic engineering is the most promising, precise and advanced strategy available today for meeting the challenges of reduced use of synthetic chemical pesticides, the need for nutritionally and functionally improved plants, and the need for improved resistance to pests and diseases."

The International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications, based at Cornell University, is devoted to increasing crop productivity and alleviating poverty among poor farmers in the developing world with the help of biotechnology. In a 1998 report, the organization says of agricultural biotech research since 1986: "It is noteworthy that 25,000 transgenic trials were conducted without encountering any significant constraints that did not lend themselves for successful and responsible management during experimentation at the field level." The report went on to say that open and responsible research "will enhance public acceptance of products that can make a critical contribution to future global food security."

The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, at the World Bank, another organization devoted to mobilizing agricultural science on behalf of the world's poor and hungry, says biotechnology will be key in developing sustainable food production and poverty reduction: "The biotechnology revolution is here and we should harness its potential. However, biotechnology raises important questions relating to ethics, intellectual property rights and biosafety. We need to scrutinize these issues in the light of reason, not emotion," says the group's chairman, Ismail Serageldin.

According to the National Academy of Sciences: "Bioengineered seeds have the potential to revolutionize agriculture and improve environmental quality by making it possible to reduce the use of pesticides."

The Food and Drug Administration, which has done extensive research and review of agricultural biotechnology products, notes in an agency policy paper: "These crops exhibit improved shelf-life, processing characteristics, flavor, nutritional properties, and agronomic characteristics.... The FDA regulates foods and food ingredients developed by genetic engineering by the same provisions and regulations that it regulates other food products. This means that a food or food ingredient developed by genetic engineering must meet the same rigorous safety standards as other food products."

U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, in an address before the National Corn Growers and American Soybean Associations, is on record as saying: "We need to do more to educate people, to get them confident in our science-based review process and then raise the awareness of the promise of biotechnology to protect our environment and feed our people."

When other voices are heard, it becomes apparent that biotechnology is far from universally reviled. And while many urge caution and regulation (as Monsanto does), not one advocates the cessation of research or development of agricultural biotechnology. It is simply too important to our future.

There are no easy answers. Only informed discussion in which all opinions are heard will move us forward to reap the benefits and avoid any potential downsides of biotechnology.

Thankfully, today with the Internet this information is easy to find and accessible to anyone with a computer, modem and sufficient interest to take the time to look. Critics and those who provide information services to the public who ignore these reasonable voices and well researched views are not engaged in an informed debate. Rather, they are engaged in campaigns of misinformation and fear.

Monsanto is committed to and welcomes open and informed dialogue. We invite comments at our U.S. Web site http://www.monsanto.com or at Monsanto UK.