GM food in Britain

Crop

The debate over genetically modified GM food has raged in Britain for years, with many people preferring to buy organic food to guarantee it's naturally grown. But now a chief scientist has said GM food is essential.

Professor John Beddington, the Government's chief scientist, has said GM food is essential to help tackle climate change and the rising population.

He said the world needs to produce 50 percent more food by 2030 in order to feed the growing population, and the only way to do this is to grow more crops on less land by using the latest scientific innovations. This would include crops genetically modified to be drought or disease resistant.

"This is such a problem that you cannot say we will not use GM technology - that would be really unwise," he said.

Report

Beddington's comments come at the same time that a new Royal Society report also recommends GM crops to tackle what could be an impending food crisis, The Telegraph reports.

The report entitled 'Reaping the Benefits: Towards a Sustainable Intensification of Global Agriculture' is expected to suggest that GM crops could even be grown in Britain.

Future of GM

GM has recently come back onto the political agenda. The first trial in a year was recently re-started in Leeds, with the Government's support, and a recent report on food security from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs backed further research into the technology.

Speaking at a global food summit, organised by the not-for-profit environmental research centre CABI, Beddington said that by 2030 the world will have to produce 50 percent more food and energy, together with 30 percent more available fresh water, whilst adapting to the floods and drought caused by climate change.

Beddington went on to say how Britain could lead the way in developing the new technology - although he said it would be hard to grow GM crops in Britain because of activists destroying the plants.

"Ten years ago, when GM was first started, people were understandably worried about about health and environmental impacts. But I think current regulations mean those risks are now mitigated," he said.

Dr Julian Little, Chairman of the Agricultural Biotechnology Council, said 13 million farmers are already growing GM on 125 million hectares around the world.

"If we are serious about producing more food off less land, we do not have much choice but to use new biotechnology, including GM," he said.

Clare Oxborrow, Senior Food Campaigner with Friends of the Earth, said, "We do have a 'perfect storm' with the impending food crisis, climate change and the recent economic crisis."

"It might seem like the perfect opportunity for the bio-tech industry to promote its products but the drivers of this crisis are so complex and need to be tackled at a fundamental level - just the thought that GM can solve this or play an important part is pie in the sky."

The issue of GM foods is never going to be straight cut. If the government does chose to introduce more GM food, it will find itself with a lot of opposition to contend with. But they have to deal with the fact that if something isn't done, then by 2030, Britain is going to be suffering significantly with a shortage of food.

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