BIOTECHNOLOGY ASSISTED PLANT BREEDING - SOLUTION FOR FEEDING THE WHOLE LOT OF PEOPLE

SOME DISHEARTENING FACTS:

Ø  The total population of the world is 7.046 billion in 2012.

Ø  The growth rate is 1.2% per year.

Ø  Global cereal utilization in 2013/14 is projected to be 2,413 million tons, 3.2 percent higher than in 2012/13.

Ø  Agricultural land area is decreasing rapidly and is the major challenge for feeding   the whole world.

Ø  About 800 million people go to bed hungry daily.

Ø  About 1.5 billion people (i.e.) almost one fifth of the total people earn less than a dollar per day.

Ø  Human population will be around 11 billion by 2100.

Ø  If the same trend continues then inevitably more people will be starving to death. On an average, for every two seconds one person losses his life due to starvation.   

So, something has to be done in order to overcome this sad state of billions. Only solution is to enhance the breeding strategy of agricultural crops.

I feel that it’s time for novel biotechnological approaches to assist breeding. The acceptance and wide usage of Marker Assisted Breeding is a positive sign. But sadly only variations, rather only the superior traits/QTLs/genes that occur naturally can be exploited.

Another approach, ‘TRANSGENIC SCIENCE’ has to be exploited. Unfortunately, due to unawareness about the safety and efficiency of this novel strategy, its usage is limited to only a few countries.

The take home message from this piece of information is to “create awareness about the efficiency of biotechnology (especially transgenics)  in order to achieve the dream of feeding the whole world with quality food.”