Experts believe that genetically modified technology provides an opportunity for the sustainable development of China’s agriculture

By YIN PUMIN

China is expected to approve commercial planting of genetically modified (GM) rice in three to five years as a major effort to raise levels of the food supply.

Huang Dafang, Director of the Biotechnology Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences,said China faces the shrinking of its farm land together with an increasing population and will turn to GM technology to ensure grain security.

On November 27, 2009, the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) issued biosafety certificates for two strains of GM rice,Huahui 1 and Bt Shanyou 63, to the National Center of Plant Gene Research at Huazhong Agricultural University based in Wuhan City,central China’s Hubei Province.

“The certi fi cate is the last step before the strain goes to the market, but the strains need registration and production trials before commercial output can begin, which may take three to five years,” Huang said.

A national strategy

Huang said the GM crops were of great signi fi cance for the sustainable development of agriculture and China’s competitiveness in the global arena.

“We are technically advantaged in hybrid rice planting. And genetically modi fi ed technology could ensure China’s superiority in food production,” said Huang, who is also a member of the MOA’s Biosafety Committee

China, a populous country of 1.3 billion people, has put food security high on its agenda for national development planning.

China’s central authorities, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, China’s cabinet, issued the No.1 Document on January 31, 2010,to push forward the industrialization of GM crops on the basis of scienti fi c appraisal and management in accordance with law.

“This again makes the industrialization of new GM products a national strategy,”said Deng Xiuxin, President of Huazhong Agricultural University.

“GM products research has entered a new phase,” he said.

HAVE A TRY: Zhang Qifa, Director of the National Center of Plant Gene Research at Huazhong Agricultural University, tastes fried genetically modified rice on February 8, 2010

Despite the rapid progress in agriculture in China, supply shortages has emerged with some products, as indicated by the peaks in imports of vegetable oil, said Chen Xiwen,Director of the Office of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, when talking about the importance and urgency of modernization of agriculture’s productivity.

China’s rice output is No.1 in the world,accounting for 33 percent of its total. The country produces approximately 500 million tons of rice annually. With a population expected to grow to 1.6 billion by 2020, 630 million tons of rice a year will be needed.

In July 2008, the State Council approved a mid- and long-term grain security plan that aims to increase grain output by 50 million tons between 2009 and 2020.

“Once GM technology is used for mass production, it would definitely help China achieve that target and feed its 1.3 billion people,” Huang said.

“It will be of great political and economic signi fi cance,” he said.

“The use of GM technology is an inevitable trend in the global agriculture industry,including China,” he said, adding that it has been scientifically proven approved GM strains are as safe as non-GM varieties.

Currently, 10 percent of non-GM rice output is lost annually because of pests, but the loss could be avoided by the wide use of the technology, Huang said.

Both GM rice strains being trialed contain proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis bacteria that allow them to resist rice stem borer, the most serious rice pest in China.

Stem borers can affect 3.3 million hectares of China’s rice fields, resulting in 5-percent loss in yields at a cost of 10 billion yuan ($1.47 billion) a year.

GM rice would help reduce the use of pesticides by 80 percent while raising yields by as much as 8 percent, said scientist Huang Jikun of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

The country is seeding GM technology with a sizeable investment of more than 20 billion yuan ($2.93 billion) from the Central Government and additional matched funding from its provincial counterparts.

By 2020, the country could be a leader in GM foods, cloning, large-scale GM technology and promotion of new strains, Huang said.

Tang Renjian, Deputy Director of the Of fi ce of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, said innovation in technology would help alleviate the supply shortage.Cautious management and assessment will be carried out on which strains to promote and industrialize.

Food safety

As for people’s concerns about the safety of GM food, Wu Yongning, a food safety specialist with the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said current studies“have not proved GM food harmful to human health.”

Wu said GM food had to pass scrupulous testing in order to be available for sale; including laboratory and fi eld studies, toxicity and allergy tests.

Besides, health administrations are to establish a system to monitor and report adverse effects, said Wu.

“I am not ruling out all possible risks,but the risks of GM food are no greater than that of traditional ones, given the heavy use of pesticide in growing traditional food,” he said.

The State Council introduced a regulation in 2001 to ensure the safety of GM food, with strict provisions on research, testing, production and marketing.

Huazhong Agricultural University says nutrition, toxic and allergy analysis shows the two GM varieties are as safe as natural ones.

“The anti-pest Bacillus thuringiensis only accumulates on the rice’s stalks and leaves and hardly reaches the grains, which puts its safety above suspicion,” said Zhu Yingguo, a noted hybrid rice scientist at the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

The MOA said, the two authorized strains of GM rice have undergone a strict five stages already—research, pilot experiments, environmental release, experimental production and safety certi fi cation.

Huang of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences said the GM rice was less vulnerable to insects and diseases and,as a result, less pesticide was needed, which was safer for human beings and the environment.

The International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Application says about 224,000 tons of pesticide less were applied around the world during the decade between 1996 and 2006, because of the expansion of GM planting.

Besides, the reduced workload to pesticide the crops would help ease the labor shortfall in China’s countryside resulting from the large population of migrant workers going to the cities, said Huang.

Zhang Qifa, Director of the National Center of Plant Gene Research at Huazhong Agricultural University, said he and his colleagues would make efforts to improve public awareness about GM technology and eliminate their doubts concerning it. ■