Agricultural Biotechnology

 Agriculture Biotechnology

Agricultural Biotechnology is the use of new scientific techniques based on our understanding of DNA to improve crops and livestock that are not possible with conventional breeding alone. This can be achieved in part by modern molecular plant breeding techniques such as marker-assisted selection (MAS). MAS enables plant breeders to identify better traits in plants more rapidly than conventional breeding alone is capable of. Another aspect of agricultural biotechnology involves the use of recombinant DNA. Unlike molecular plant breeding, however, recombinant DNA technology results in new traits that cannot be achieved by conventional ways.

The genetic engineering of crops for improved agronomic and nutritional traits has been widely reviewed in the literature. Briefly, genetic engineering involves the introduction of a novel trait into a crop through the manipulation of its genetic material. Genetic material can be incorporated into the plant genome either via Agrobacterium-mediated transformation or by biolistic (gene gun) delivery, as illustrated in Figure 1. Transgenic, or genetically modified (GM) crops, have been commercially available in the United States since 1996. A well-known example of a transgenic plant is Golden Rice, which expresses β-carotene and was created philanthropically with the intent of alleviating vitamin A deficiency (VAD) in developing countries. Cisgenic plants, or plants that express genes from close wild relatives, are also being generated to obtain resistance genes which were lost over years of crop domestication. The Wheat Stem Rust Initiative, for example, is currently generating cisgenic versions of wheat which possess multiple resistance genes to the fungal pathogen Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici Ugg99 from wild relatives. A third technology that falls under the umbrella of genetic engineering is RNA interference, or RNAi technology. In this case, the plant is designed to produce an antisense RNA to a particular gene, whose expression is then blocked via gene silencing. Examples of the use of this technology are GM papaya which are resistant to Papaya ring spot virus. This technology is responsible for saving the Hawaiian papaya industry. More recently, a new technology known as ‘gene editing’ has come to the forefront. Gene editing does not require the introduction of new gene sequences; rather, it can direct only one or two nucleotide changes in a plant genome and thus is exempt from the regulations that govern the production of genetically modified organisms. While no examples of gene-edited crops are commercially available at present, much research is being undertaken in this field and many new crop varieties will be realized in years to come using this biotechnological approach.

Biosafety for Sustainable Agriculture

Agricultural biotechnology has the potential to advance crop productivity production enhancement and improve food security at global level. There is a growing alarm about the genetically engineered crops and its environment effects on food chain. Though, acceptance of such technologies has consequences, there is need for creating biosafety regulatory systems to decrease and eradicate possible potential risks arising from agricultural biotechnology on flora and fauna. India, as a party to the Convention on Biological Diversity and Cartagena Protocol, has acquired the responsibility of strengthening her biosafety structure very sincerely. The present chapter points a relative lesson of the accessible national and international biosafety frameworks in place in India, with the UNEPGEF Framework implemented across 126 countries. The intention of this chapter is to categorize confrontations within the system and possibilities how to minimize the risk of genetically modified organisms to the society.