AGRICULTURAL BIOTECHNOLOGY: Opportunities and Risks.

• Author: REYNOLDS, ROBERT W.

Genetically engineered crops, fertilizers, and pesticides are the keys to the enormous challenges brought about by increasing population and environmental degradation.

EVERY CENTURY poses new opportunities and challenges. One hundred years ago, developments such as wireless telecommunications, automobiles, manned flight, space travel, world war, atomic energy, global warming, and cloning were the province of a few thinkers and science fiction writers.

The ideas, trends, and technical advances that will shape the 21st century are already in play, if not always apparent. Some will develop slowly; others will emerge with profound rapidity. Some discoveries, potential catastrophes, and windfalls are unforeseeable; others are clearly on the horizon. In each case, it will be the measure of policymakers, philosophers, governments, and humanity as a whole to meet each challenge and determine which tools can solve emerging problems and propel continued human progress.

Rampant population growth and its effects on global food supplies and nutrition are among the most significant challenges for the next century. For instance, of the world's nearly 5,800,000,000 people, it is estimated that approximately 800,000,000 are chronically undernourished. Although trends indicate that the world population has stabilized gradually--particularly in developed countries--it is expected to continue rising for the foreseeable future and could reach an estimated 7,700,000,000 by 2025. Perhaps more important, the Population Institute has estimated that as many as 74 countries in the Third World are on a course to double their populations within less than 30 years.

While the expanding population has placed pressures on global agricultural resources, historic strides have been made toward meeting many basic food needs. The "green revolution," which has emerged over the last 30 years, has improved global production and capacity. For example, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, per capita food supplies in the developing world rose from 1,900 calories per day in the early 1960s to 2,500 by the early 1990s, even though population doubled during this period. Yet, despite the significant progress made in feeding an expanding population and improving agricultural yields, the World Bank has concluded that "rising population and unequal participation in growth have left 1,300,000,000 people in the world struggling to survive on less than one dollar a day, and the number continues to rise."

The planet is confronted with a series of severe challenges that arise out of population growth, as well as political instability and economic development and dislocations. These include dwindling natural resources; diminution of arable land due to erosion, urbanization, and degradation; water shortages resulting from pollution and bad irrigation practices; and general environmental degradation as a result of poor land use practices, industrial development, and toxins released into the air and soil.

Clearly, no single solution can address all of these challenges. Indeed, it is the breadth and interconnectedness of the problems that cry out for comprehensive political, technological, and economic strategies. However, as nations muster the policies and resources to meet the challenges of the next century, it is equally clear that the science of biotechnology has...