Bioengineered Crops: The Commercial and Ethical Considerations

Recombinant DNA technology has opened up a novel field for the agricultural biotechnologists to explore and design custom-made crops with specific trait(s). In addition to enhancing yield, transgenic plants are designed to have enhanced defense against pathogens, remove toxic compounds from the soil, to be tolerant to environmental stresses, to be live bioreactors to produce pharmaceuticals, to have improved nutritional features reflecting changes in protein, oil or vitamin content or to have woody species with lower generation time. But all plants with novel characters come with a price. The objective of the article is to evaluate the utility of the transgenic plants with respect to their novel features, the economic implications, seed security, agricultural sustainability and food safety. The gene mapping program of Arabidopsis and rice gives rise to the ethical question of the commercial patentability of the bioengineered plants. The impact of this science on agriculture that is being faced by the world with special reference to the developing countries of Asia is being discussed.