We are witnessing widespread protests against the use of BT in the food crops esp in brinjal in India. Reasons attributed are the health and the environment issues. Government appointed a committee to look into the details and for collecting opinon of the ppl in this regard. The panel had been welcomed by the protests from across all the sections of ppl at all the places. Many states had already banned BT brinjal even before central govt took a decision on the issue and clearly stated their stance but govt wants to go ahead citing shortage issues.
4 comments:
The Bt brinjal issue should be handled with care as we have a bitter experience in the case of Bt cotton in Maharashtra. This was one of the major contributors to the crop failure leading the widespread farmer suicides in Vidarbha. The collective action by activists has brought initial success in terms of formation of committee. But it still remains to be seen whether the committee functions impartially or bows down to the interests of a few beneficiaries.
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BT products have potentially hazardous long term effects. They are also very costly compared to others. It also brings in the dependence on private players, which can lead to bad consequences for farmers. There are many other problems with BT products. Already we have seen widespread protests against BT Cotton in Maharashtra. Perhaps foreseeing them, many states have banned these products.
BT products are being banned in many parts of India due to their potential ill effects leading to negative consequences but with the modification of such products and rectifying the shortcomings it can go a long way in solving the increasing food problems in our country because initially it had problems so even in future we can't be prejudiced against it...but to make people come out of this hate mode..a sense of collective action by people in the field of BIOTECHNOLOGY is required like clearing of doubts in front of media, distributing the pamplets about the modifications and also convincing peoiple that its no more harmful..though the process in difficult with unpredictable outcomes..still its worth the effort so as to solve the problems of hunger, starvation and loss of crops to pests
Dinamani Tamil Daily had voiced the concern of antagonists to the introduction of the GM Brinjal on the major ground that the same had not been introduced in many other advanced countries and India is being used to try its probable ill effects.
Scientists of eminence like Dr MS Swaminathan are not likely to mislead us. On the face of it there is no harm likely by using a variety that would allow pod borer insects to attack and spoil the fruit, thus helping farmers to avoid the expense and risk of spraying toxic sprays.
A friend above says that the implanted Bt gene kills the pest by hurting the organs of the inset and it is feared that the same injury may be caused to humans by consuming the GM brinjal. In that case farmers use so many chemicals on other brinjal varieties to arrest the pest attacks and they all contain some poison (contact poison or nervous poison that paralyses the insects) which are also toxic.Actually the dosage of chemicals recommended for spray - at the recommended dilution and application - are much below deramal / oral toxicity for humans. The bacterial gene is also considered for probable toxicity before release (the expt was going on Indian labs also along with other countries - but released earlier by other countries, according to scientists).
It is true that the GM crops would cost much and would require use of fresh seeds every time, thus benefiting the seed industry involved. There could be malpractices in the lax supervision of Indian official channels also. But the blame on the technology on other health grounds are argued more on assumed fears, it appears, than solid counters.
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