Genetic engineering offers a promising future where hunger is reduced through enhanced productivity. However, this promise comes with responsibilities and risks that cannot be ignored.
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Despite global efforts, food security and undernourishment have remained persistently high, particularly in Southeast and South Asia, over the last three years. The COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased hunger and nourishment levels globally, however the levels remain largely unchanged since 2020. The average levels of undernourishment in India for the years 2021-2023 remain at 16.6 percent, compared to the global average of 9.2 percent.
Assured food security is influenced by a myriad of factors, including political, environmental, and socioeconomic conditions, natural disasters, and warfare. Biotechnology and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have played a significant role in enhancing food security. However, the emergence of Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) technology can help reduce agricultural vulnerability to famine and viruses and increase the potency of plant production and thus potentially revolutionise food security through precise genetic modifications.
Biotechnology and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have played a significant role in enhancing food security.
CRISPR has many advantages in agricultural use, including enhanced crop resistance to pests, diseases, and environmental stresses; increased crop yield; enhanced nutritional content of crops through biofortification; and shortened breeding and yield times. In a country like India, where food insecurity and undernourishment run high, using GMOs in agriculture seems like an intuitive solution. However, like much of the world, the Indian public has negative perceptions of GMOs due to previous experiences related to the Hybrid Bt Cotton case.
Hybrid Bt cotton, India's only commercialised GM crop, introduced by private company Monsanto in 2022, failed conclusively, causing significant harm to human and animal health. Subsequently, the Union government's proposal to commercialise herbicide-tolerant (HT) mustard severely threatens Indian mustard agriculture and public health. Regulatory bodies, plagued by conflicts of interest, have consistently promoted GMOs despite substantial evidence of their risks including viral and bacterial bias and vulnerability. Since 2005, petitioners have resisted the introduction of GMOs in India, citing the failure of the Bt cotton variant that led to infected crops across multiple states.
The Technical Expert Committee (TEC) and two Parliamentary Standing Committees (2012 and 2017) have underscored these concerns. GMOs, which involve laboratory-based genetic modifications, create organisms with unintended effects that traditional breeding methods do not produce. Issues such as contamination of natural environments, especially in biodiversity hotspots like India, and the economic burden on farmers due to increased costs and pest resurgence have been highlighted. While GMOs have many benefits, the public perspective cannot be ignored. This case resulted in even present-day resistance to adopt GMO grains in agriculture.
The use of GMOs in agriculture recalls certain ethical and regulatory considerations. One consideration is ensuring responsible use. Each country has a responsible use and awareness of GMOs. The European Union is still largely resistant to GMO foods. Africa is another region that has yet to decide its stance on GMO adoption. Despite severe food insecurity, the public’s perspective on GMOs in Africa has resisted adoption.
While CRISPR holds great promise for enhancing food security, its application must be carefully regulated to ensure ethical use and avoid unintended consequences.
One notable exception in the resistance to GMO adoption is a country with a history of severe food insecurity, Vietnam. Despite the adverse impact of Agent Orange (mainly manufactured by Monsanto) during the Vietnam War, which ended in 1975, Vietnam is now opening up to GMOs, including those developed by Monsanto, and 45 food varieties to ensure food availability.
While CRISPR holds great promise for enhancing food security, its application must be carefully regulated to ensure ethical use and avoid unintended consequences. Countries like the United States (US), Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Colombia have adopted product-based regulations that exempt gene-edited crops from GMO monitoring if they contain no exogenous DNA. Further, some regions like the European Union, Japan, and New Zealand require all GMO foods to be labelled to ensure user caution.
Driven from the pressure of the Food and Drug Administration and Environmental Protection Agency and increasing public concern, the United States (US) is also leaning toward mandatory labelling of GMO foods. In 2016, the US passed the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Law, with mandatory compliance effective from 2022, which also required disclosure of products that do not use CRISPR but could not be bred without genetic intervention to disclose bioengineered processes. This regulatory approach facilitates the adoption of CRISPR technology while maintaining safety standards.
However, these regulations cannot address all concerns about an ever-evolving industry such as genetic engineering, particularly in the research and development phase. The challenge of CRISPR or any genetic engineering technology is the potential for off-target effects, where unintended genetic modifications occur. Biosafety regulations cannot always target R&D concerns like off-target effects; these are more appropriately covered under ethical guidelines for scientists and researchers. Policies aim to minimise these off-target changes by optimising guide RNAs (sgRNAs), Cas proteins, and delivery methods. Techniques such as incorporating highly specific sgRNAs and modifying sgRNA sequences show promise in reducing off-target activity.
The challenge of CRISPR or any genetic engineering technology is the potential for off-target effects, where unintended genetic modifications occur.
However, there are three areas that biosafety policies should cover. The first is Intellectual Property Rights (IPR). IPR, in the context of genetic engineering and agriculture, pertain to the ownership and control of GMOs and related technologies. Companies that develop genetically engineered seeds often patent their innovations, granting them exclusive rights to produce and sell them. This can lead to significant market power and influence over agricultural practices. While critics of IPR in GMOs counter its necessity, citing potential monopolies, IPRs are necessary to increase accountability in case of off-target effects and traceability for future innovation. Monopolies in this area can be countered by introducing a requirement to align with existing competition laws or formulating a biotechnology innovation and competition policy.
The second is the promise of food security. As discussed, GMOs can contribute to higher yields and more reliable food supplies. However, there are concerns that reliance on genetically modified crops might reduce biodiversity, make agricultural systems more vulnerable to certain pests and diseases, and marginalise smallholder farmers who may be unable to afford or access these technologies. Domestic biosafety policies must consider indigenous diversity, as advocated in the HT mustard case.
Finally, there is the case of potential agro-terrorism. It refers to the deliberate introduction of pests, diseases, or toxins into the agricultural sector with the intent to cause harm. Genetic engineering in agriculture raises specific concerns about agro-terrorism because it involves manipulating the genetic makeup of crops. The intentional infection of agricultural fields that are not resistant to viruses, such that GMO crops might be resistant to impact trade, food security, and even reliance on private companies for patented GMO seeds, could result in economic displacement for farmers and increased suffering for consumers.
Ensuring robust security measures and ethical guidelines in developing and disseminating genetically engineered organisms is essential to prevent such malicious acts and safeguard global food supplies.
While two cases have been noted since 1912, these are usually categorised under biological or chemical agent use. The recorded use of GMOs in agriculture was seen with Agent Orange in Vietnam, which still impacts the population today. This is not directly read as a case of agro-terrorism, but rather of use of a biological agent as a herbicide was not targeted at cropland, while crops were affected. However, with growing technologies and biotechnologies and the increased knowledge of virulence, we must ensure that such attacks that can occur and impact crops must also be covered in biosafety and biosecurity policies. Ensuring robust security measures and ethical guidelines in developing and disseminating genetically engineered organisms is essential to prevent such malicious acts and safeguard global food supplies. While 173 countries, including India, are signatories of the Cartagena protocol that oversees biodiversity and human health in biosafety, including these areas in domestic regulations and policies and ensuring implementation by national-level governing committees will help ensure occurrences of cases such as the Bt Cotton case are rare.
As the global population grows, ensuring food security becomes increasingly urgent. Genetic engineering offers remarkable potential to enhance agricultural productivity and resilience, promising a future where hunger and malnutrition could be significantly reduced. However, this promise comes with responsibilities and risks that cannot be ignored. Intellectual Property Rights associated with GMOs must be carefully managed to ensure that the benefits of biotechnology are accessible to all farmers, regardless of their size or economic status. The misuse of genetic technology to harm crops and livestock poses a real and present danger, necessitating robust security measures and ethical guidelines to prevent potential biological attacks. Vigilance and cooperation on a global scale are essential to ensure that the advancements in biotechnology truly benefit humanity while safeguarding against emerging threats. The road ahead is complex, but with careful navigation, it holds the promise of a brighter, more secure future.
Shravishtha Ajaykumar is an Associate Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation
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Shravishtha Ajaykumar is Associate Fellow at the Centre for Security, Strategy and Technology. Her fields of research include geospatial technology, data privacy, cybersecurity, and strategic ...
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