|
The socio-political ramifications of biotechnologies in developing countries
are extremely complex. Not only do they vary from country to country and
from sector to sector of a nation's economy, they are also different for
the various segments of its population. Generalizations therefore have
scant pertinence. In order to circumscribe the subject more concretely
the following discussion will limit itself to agriculture, with the main
emphasis falling on adequate food production. This aspect is particularly
timely because over the next quarter-century grave problems of food security
will affect hundreds of millions of people. Yet to date this prospect
seems not to have aroused the concern it calls for.
Growth rates in food production over the past three decades could give
the impression that there is no cause to be concerned about an assured
supply. Between 1960 and 1990 increases in food output in the developing
countries consistently outstripped population growth.
The aggregate picture is misleading, however, for when regional statistics
are lumped together in a sum total, important - and alarming - details
go unseen:
- In 26 of the 40 low-income countries listed by the World Bank, and
in 26 of the 50 reporting countries in the middle and higher income
category, per capita food output sank in the period from 1979 to 1991.1
In most African countries south of the Sahara and in the Middle East
the degree of self-sufficiency in grains, the most important staples
of these regions, decreased.2
- Annual growth rates in yields per hectare of rice and wheat fell off
in some of the most productive areas of cultivation in Asia, mainly
those where very intensive agriculture was practised over many years.
In the opinion of FAO, the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation, this
trend will continue well into the 21st century.3
The FAO anticipates that by 2010 many developing countries that were
hitherto net exporters will have become net importers of agricultural
products - and this in the face of continuing precarious shortages of
foreign exchange.
| Food Security in Developing Countries |
| Country |
Average yearly
growth rate |
Degree of
self-sufficiency |
Food aid
in form of grain |
| |
Population
in % |
Food
production
per capita
(1979-81 =100) |
in |
in 1000s of |
| |
1991-2000 |
1979-1991 |
1971 |
1990 |
1979/80 |
1990/91 |
Low-income
countries |
|
| Mozambique |
2.9 |
-3.1 |
89 |
54 |
151 |
454 |
| Ethiopia |
2.7 |
-1.4 |
99 |
87 |
111 |
894 |
| Malawi |
3.1 |
-2.7 |
101 |
94 |
5 |
181 |
| Niger |
3.5 |
-3.4 |
108 |
93 |
9 |
79 |
| Bangladesh |
1.9 |
-0.6 |
97 |
87 |
1,480 |
1,356 |
Middle-income
countries |
|
| Philippines |
1.9 |
-1.9 |
94 |
83 |
95 |
81 |
| Dominican Rep. |
1.6 |
-2.6 |
64 |
35 |
120 |
6 |
| Jordan |
4.0 |
-1.2 |
48 |
9 |
72 |
481 |
| Syria |
3.4 |
-2.9 |
76 |
69 |
74 |
30 |
Sources: World Bank: World Development Report
1993. Investments in Health.
Washington, D.C., 1993, Table 4, p. 296 ff.; FAO: Agriculture Toward
2010.
27th Session, Rome 6-25 November 1993, p. 17 ff. |
We are living in a time when the world's population grows by around 250,000
people every day, while the natural resources required to feed them decrease
day by day. At present we are losing about 3,000 square meters of forest
and 1,000 tons of topsoil every second; numerous species of flora and
fauna are being wiped out; and year after year arable land shrinks by
20,000 hectares.4 Erosion alone has so far
made a billion hectares of soil unusable for agriculture.5
Funding for international co-operation in agricultural development amounts
to less in per capita real terms today than was the case only a few years
ago. Problems that in the past could be solved under relatively favourable
auspices in respect of available land, irrigation possibilities and ecological
margins (fertilisers, plant protection), and with commensurate financial
outlays, will in future have to be tackled under far more unfavourable
conditions. This outlook imparts urgency to the question of whether and
how higher agricultural yields can be achieved in adverse environments
with the aid of new technologies.
So much is certain: food security in the developing countries must
not come to depend on surpluses from the industrialized countries or,
worse, food aid. For a number of political, economic and ecological
reasons this would not make sense. Food security must be striven for in
the affected countries themselves. Thought must therefore be given to
the future nutritional needs of their people and to ways and means of
meeting those needs locally.
 1.1. magnitude
of nutrition problems
According to FAO figures food security in the developing countries has
improved appreciably over the past 30 years. The supply increased from
1,950 calories per capita in the early 1960s to 2,475 calories in the
early 90s, even though population almost doubled during the same period.6
But these lump figures conceal the fact that several regions failed notably
to progress; in some countries, indeed, poverty, and with it hunger, increased
dramatically. Sub-Saharan Africa in particular lagged distinctly behind
other developing regions. There the per capita calorie supply has declined
since the early 1970s.7
Again according to the FAO, the number of chronically undernourished
people has also gone down, from 941 million in 1969/71 to 781 million
in 1988/90.8 Yet given these figures, we can
only conclude that for multitudes of people in the developing world a
dependable provision of food is already today an unfulfilled dream. Where
improvements have come about they have scarcely reached the lower strata
of society.
1.2. future food
requirements
The Population Reference Bureau projects an increase in world population
from around 5.6 billion in 1994 to more than 7 billion in 2010 and almost
8.4 billion in 2025.9 The picture in the developing
world presents thus:
| Population by regions in 1994 |
| Region |
Population |
Projected Population |
| |
mid-1994 |
2010 |
2025 |
|
| Africa |
700 |
1,078 |
1,538 |
Latin America
& Caribbean |
470 |
584 |
679 |
| Asia excl. Japan |
3,257 |
4,123 |
4,981 |
| Total |
4,437 |
5,784 |
7,108 |
|
Of the 90 million or so new-born added to the earth's population each
year, more than 95 percent are born in the developing countries. Asia's
current population growth of 58 million annually is the world's largest;
Africa's with a yearly growth rate of 2.9 percent, is the steepest. How
to provide all these additional mouths with a qualitatively an quantitatively
adequate diet defines one of the hugest challenges facing the international
community. Only in rare cases is hunger a matter of actual shortfalls
of food; as a rule it is a consequence of dire poverty. Production increases
alone can never be the solution to nutrition problems, and measures to
reduce poverty must be an integral part of every effort to combat hunger.
This said, there is no doubt that expanded foodstuff production is likewise
imperative in order to preclude shortages. If we set our sights on surmounting
chronic undernourishment - under a favourable scenario the FAO predicts
that 637 million will still be suffering from it in 2010 - or if we hope
to vanquish the hidden hunger that at present afflicts hundreds of millions
of malnourished people, then by 2010, 15 years or so down the road, food
output will have to be more than doubled. And by the year 2050 a further
50 percent increase in demand is expected.10
Since the successes of the Green Revolution in expanding crop yields
it has not proved possible to even remotely approach increases of the
order recorded then. And estimates of the food production increases that
will be required are optimistic in a twofold sense. On the one hand they
fail to take into account that when part of the population of a developing
country becomes more prosperous its eating habits change, and more meat
in the diet means that not all of the foodstuffs produced are directly
consumed. On the other hand the estimates fail to take into consideration
that the high past increases were achieved in part thanks to inputs such
as intensive fertilisation or exploitation of fossil aquifers and methods
such as cultivation of land endangered by erosion that do not meet the
sustainability imperative and are therefore out of the question in future.
The Action Group on Food Security, a high-calibre American expert body,11
foresees the demand for grain in the developing countries as amounting
by 2020 to more than three times the present US harvest, which was around
310 million tons in 1990 or about one-fifth of the world total.12
Greater demand for wheat and rice will be especially pronounced - for
wheat because ongoing urbanization is changing dietary habits in the direction
of foods prepared from it; for rice because Asia, as noted, has to cope
with the largest population growth. The developing countries, above all
in Asia, produce and consume more than 95 percent of global rice output.
The demand for rice in these countries is expected to rise from about
350 million tons today to double that amount by 2025,13
or more than 2 1/2 times what China grew in 1990. And China is the world's
leading rice producer by far.
In addition to higher demand for wheat, rice and other cereal grains,
substantial increases in the demand for all other foodstuffs are also
anticipated, most notably potatoes, cassava, pulses and others. These
constitute around 40 percent of the food consumed in the developing countries.
2.1. general considerations
Because hunger and undernourishment are first and foremost a consequence
of flawed or inadequate social and economic development, it will require
broad social and political transformation to overcome them lastingly.
To this end people must first be mobilized to amend static traditional
modes of thinking and behaving, and then economic and technical innovations
must follow - forms of organization such as co-operatives, for example,
or more efficient tools and cultivation methods. Since food shortages
in the Third World stem from the interplay of poverty, inequity, low yields
and declining environment quality, the most promising strategies will
be those that address all three problems simultaneously. This approach
can be described as the comprehensive and sustained improvement of economic
capability and of the conditions shaping rural society. In other words:
advancement of those who live on and off the land, with particular attention
to the female population. In view of the obvious connection between high
population growth and diminishing food security it would further be desirable
to augment rural development strategies with components known from experience
to lead to sinking birth rates.14
In principle, there are two roads towards maintaining agricultural output
in general and food production in particular at a level that is unproblematic
to satisfy demand:
- Expansion of land under cultivation, and/or
- Intensified cultivation, i.e. higher productivity per unit.
Considerable reserves still exist in the developing countries for expanding
agricultural land. They are very unevenly distributed, however, and are
to be found mainly in Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa.15
The Asian countries, especially the most densely populated, have only
slight expansion possibilities.
Because of in part rapidly deteriorating environment quality and the
dwindling availability of water resources, efforts aimed at intensified
cultivation are now much more critical than only 20 years ago. Although
it is very difficult to quantify the direct influence of soil erosion,
salinization or loss of humus on food production, there can be no doubt
that henceforth increases by means of intensified cultivation will be
viable long-term only if they do not impair the environment.
Both roads - expansion and intensification - show clear benefits and
risks. On the risk side, expansion of land under cultivation often proves
very costly, for example when it entails building artificial irrigation
systems or exploiting mountainous terrain. It is often ecologically risky
as well, as for example when forests (worst of all tropical rain forests)
are cleared or marginal soil suitable for extensive livestock farming
but not for intensive cultivation is put under tillage. A further potential
risk lies in the overuse of farmland obtained by burn-off. In such cases
irreversible damage may come about through erosion and soil impoverishment:
in the extreme case desertification.16
Refer to diagrams showing;
When cultivation is intensified with the aid of fertilisers, new seed
varieties, controlled irrigation, integrated plant protection, mechanisation
and intercropping, the benefits of short-term yield increases also have
to be set against the costs and ecological risks. Excessive use of fertilisers
and plant protection agents and over-intensive mechanisation are not only
costly; as we know from experience in many an industrial country, they
have unwanted effects on the environment, too.
Nevertheless, on balance the potential for increasing yields through
intensification and modernization carried out in conformity with the ecosystem
outweighs the alternative, i.e. expanded acreage. Grain harvests per hectare
in the Third World are only one-half as high as in Europe; in Sub-Saharan
Africa they yield as little as one-fifth17
- and similar differences apply to other food crops. Stepping up tillage
intensity and securing crop yields depends on a variety of input factors
that have to be employed selectively and with different emphases from
case to case: labor, advice and training, irrigation, fertiliser, seed,
plant protection, and mechanisation. Seed varieties, whether bred in the
conventional way or by recombinant genetics, are thus an essential ingredient
- though no more important in relation to the total package than, say,
the oil in a large gear unit that is in turn just part of a larger engine.
Still, any discussion of the socio-political effects of biotechnology
in the developing countries must necessarily include a closer look at
the role that seeds play.
2.2. the role
of seeds in developing countries' agriculture
The challenges to food production posed by a rapidly growing world population
and increasingly shrinking, or at least more and more scanty, natural
resources are immense. This explains why such great hopes are placed in
new seed varieties that will make consistently high yields possible. In
recent years these hopes have risen even higher, thanks to the promise
held out by biotechnology and gene technology. Already at the time of
the Green Revolution seeds played a key role in relation to the other
components: fertiliser, irrigation, plant protection and selective mechanisation.18
In the 1950s and 60s, against a backdrop of high population growth and
attendant fears of unimaginable famines (above all in Asia), scientists
associated with international (public) agricultural research centres developed
seed varieties incorporating several properties not contained in the traditional
varieties of the respective growing regions. They were distinguished by
- short vegetation periods, making possible more frequent harvesting;
- a pronounced capacity to transmute high fertiliser inputs into high
crop yields (rather than into stem and leaf growth); and
- relative insusceptibility to fluctuations in daylight.
Unwanted and unexpected side effects of the new varieties and the experience
gained with their use resulted as time went on in significant changes
in the concept and substance of the Green Revolution. In particular, by
setting - and largely attaining - two additional research objectives,
ecological shortcomings were reduced and smallholder friendliness improved,
namely:
- resistance or tolerance to plant diseases and animal pests, and
- tolerance to irregular irrigation, poor soils and other stress factors.
By and large it is undisputed that under otherwise unchanged conditions
Asia could not have escaped widespread famine without the new seed varieties.
Yet, although increased yields were originally the central research goal,
the socio-political impact of the Green Revolution was and still is highly
controversial. At the heart of the unease it caused were, together with
the ecological aspect, the distributional inequities of its benefits especially.
At least in the initial phase of the Green Revolution's implementation,
nowhere near all of the farmers (and even fewer women among them) profited
equally from the higher yields. Deplorable as this is, it was hardly surprising
in societies run along feudal and patriarchal lines.
Today genetically engineered seeds are in their turn evoking objections,
chiefly on ecological and socio-political grounds and mostly from the
same critical circles that argued against the Green Revolution.
The research goals of genetic engineering and biotechnology19
relevant to the present discussion focus on plant varieties that enable
reliable high yields at the same or lower tillage costs through qualities
such as resistance to or tolerance of plant diseases (fungi, bacteria,
viruses) and animal pests (insects, mites, nematodes) as well as to so-called
stress factors such as climatic variation or aridity. An equally important
goal is the transfer of genes with nitrogen-fixing capacity onto grain.
The realization of these aims could bring tremendous benefits.
3.1. potential
benefits
The spectrum of anticipated benefits from the application of recombinant
genetics and biotechnology in agriculture ranges from diagnostic aids,
for example in plant diseases, through to gene mapping, where the genetic
characteristics of plants are visibly cartographed, enabling speedier
identification of interesting genetic material for every kind of plant
usable in agriculture or forestry.20 The
objects of search and transfer are properties such as adaptability to
specific local climatic conditions, soil quality, crop rotation practices,
and so on. Not least, cultivation of such plants should fit into the concept
of sustainable agriculture, i.e. they should not abet erosion or leaching
of the soil. To complete the packet of desiderata, a variety should also
afford dependable or even high yields at low production costs.
Conventional seed-breeding programs have to proceed step-by-small-step
towards single targets and consume a lot of time. If in contrast selection
systems are developed for the test tube - through characterization of
genetic markers for certain properties, for example - then research can
be carried out with perceptibly greater efficiency. For farmers both large
and small this is potentially of sizeable importance.21
The development of new plant protection techniques with the aid of gene
technology and biotechnology (primarily with Bacillus thuringiensis
as vector) has already led to noteworthy progress in respect of the environment
and lessened dependence on chemical weapons.22
It is also worth pointing out that other efforts aimed at utilising the
new technologies in animal husbandry and pisciculture are currently in
progress.23
In China especially,24 where arable land
is getting to be scarce and the use of fertilisers and plant protection
agents is nearing the ecologically tolerable limit, but in several other
countries as well, marked concrete advances in the direction of food security
have been made with the help of the new technologies.25
In contrast to just a few years ago the talk today is of a breakthrough
in the field.26 In the opinion of an international
conference of experts convened by the World Bank, UNDP and FAO, a solution
to the problem of securing world food supplies while preserving the environment
is today well-nigh inconceivable without recombinant genetics and biotechnology.27
A steadily accruing number of case studies give evidence that the two
technologies, by providing novel products and mechanisms of action, can
indeed bring us closer to solving agricultural, medical and other problems28
- problems either not solvable with traditional technologies or else only
with a far greater expenditure of time.
3.2. potential
risks
Yet in spite of the widely uncontested favourable potential of genetic
engineering and biotechnology, the climate for them in the industrial
countries remains sceptical, even to the point of rejection.29
Possible risks must always be taken seriously, of course, and it is in
everyone's ultimate interest to make sure that a risk/benefit assessment
based on a broad - but also informed - social consensus has been undertaken
before decisions are made.
The current public debate on the new technologies often suffers, however,
from a lack of specialized knowledge as well as from a failure to differentiate
between the risks inherent in a technology and those that transcend
it.
Technology-inherent risks arise when a technical action plan is designed
to improve an existing situation, but then during the research or implementation
phase unforeseeable problems and unwanted side effects crop up - undesirable
mutations, for instance. Risks of this sort must be distinguished from
those hazards which transcend technology, i.e. which emanate from its
mode of application in certain circumstances. Such risks might materialise
when proposed and technologically feasible improvements founder on social,
economic or cultural obstacles. But I submit that to throw the baby out
with the bath on account of technology-transcending risks - i.e. to flatly
demonize a technology instead of giving thought to how external conditions
could be altered for the better - is, in view of the dimensions of the
problems to be dealt with in the developing countries, short-sighted.
As the socio-political effects clearly are to be sought in the sphere
of technology-transcending risks, we shall confine ourselves to this aspect.30
 3.2.1. Technology-transcending
risks
To repeat: technology-transcending risks are not caused by a technology
as such and therefore cannot be prevented by the technology. In the developing
countries these risks spring from both the course the global economy is
taking and country-specific configurations. The most critical fears in
this context have to do with socio-political concerns:
- Aggravation of the prosperity gap between North and South through
possible substitution of tropical agricultural exports with genetically
engineered products and exploitation of indigenous genetic resources
without appropriate compensation.
- Increased inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth
because the privileged classes (by dint of better education or stronger
financial position) profit earlier and more from the introduction of
powerful technologies than do the socially disadvantaged. This problem
accompanies every innovation, of course, but the high potency of genetic
engineering and biotechnology stirs fears that the negative effects
on development may prove specially severe.
In light of the magnitude of poverty-related problems throughout most
of the developing world and the dwindling competitiveness of a great many
poor countries31, very serious heed must
be paid to these concerns.
 A. Economic risks
for developing countries contigent on international trade relations
With the new technologies it will become possible to produce in the laboratory
or in temperate zones goods that have hitherto been grown exclusively
in the tropics. This prospect gives rise to concerns that the resultant
competitive edge could drive tropical products off the market. To take
just one example, the production of vanilla aroma in the laboratory using
biotechnological techniques could have existence-threatening effects on
70,000 small farmers in Madagascar alone.32
Similar but even more far-reaching consequences could materialise in
connection with cocoa. Genetically improved cocoa varieties could not
only result in higher yields and a concomitant drop in prices. They could
also lead to the dislodging of smallhold production in the dirt-poor West
African countries by plantation-scale farming in the newly industrialized
economies of Asia.33 A comparable outcome
might happen with vegetable oils.
Furthermore, countries like Cuba or Mauritius, which depend on sugarcane
for a decisive share of their export earnings, could find themselves extremely
hard-pressed should industrial manufacture of the low-calorie protein
sweetener thaumatin or similar substances come broadly to supplant sugarcane.34
In a more holistic political perspective it cannot make sense
to uncouple the North from the agricultural raw materials of the South.
It would plunge a large part of humanity into dire misery.35
It is incompatible with a peaceful future for all the inhabitants of our
planet if life goes on getting better for a relatively small segment of
the world's already affluent population while for billions of others their
already skimpy living standard stagnates or even shrivels.
In the perspective of economic rationality, however, it has to
be expected that superior goods will conquer the market. Copper can serve
as an example. Its price is determined by the metal's electrical conductivity.
Once electric current can be conducted cheaper and better by glass or
carbon fibre, for instance, copper will in due course no longer be used
for this purpose - with corresponding consequences for demand and thus
price. The substitution will take place even though crumbling prices may
lead in countries like Zambia or Chile to mass unemployment, with all
the human distress it brings.
The same market logic tells us to expect that if lab vanilla or lab sugar
should prove cheaper or exhibit some other edge - healthier than the real
thing, for example - over products previously imported from the South,
then substitution will follow. Ultimately this process cannot be forestalled,
not even by sizeable government intervention, which is not desirable anyway.
The solution to the product substitution problem must therefore lie in
a concerted international endeavour to diversify the production
structure in vulnerable countries and not in counter-market intervention.
Here a bigger allocation of funds from the international development establishment
to the support of diversification efforts is urgently required. A comprehensive
risk/benefit analysis of the substitution of agricultural export commodities
from the tropics would also have to examine the alternative use of the
land left fallow by substitution for increasing local food production,
and perhaps ecologically opportune changes in how it is used as well -
for afforestation, for example.
Another matter attracting critical attention turns on who shall have
power of disposition over the genetic resources of the Third World. The
critics fear that multinational firms, but also government research institutes,
could gain control of the genes of plants native to the Third World free
of charge, as it were, and use them for developing and producing superior
varieties that would then be sold back to the Third World at high prices.
Suppose a multinational seeds company discovered a property in an Ethiopian
barley strain making it resistant to certain plant diseases and genetically
transferred this property to a wheat variety that would afterwards be
commercialized in Ethiopia. Obviously, Ethiopian agriculture contributed
something, but without the research and development work of the seeds
firm the something would not have been turned to use outside Ethiopia
or in food grains other than the native barley.
A step in the direction of satisfying both sides' claims to compensation
would be to work out binding national and international regulations. Urgently
needed, they should be designed to keep open access to the genetic riches
of the Third World and at the same time enable the people who have helped
to build this wealth through decades of indigenous selection to profit
equitably from the commercial returns on gene exports. The question of
whether remuneration is due has been clearly and positively answered by
Article 19 of the Rio Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCED 1992)
and the virtually unanimous consensus of the agencies engaged in development.
It would not only be unjust and unfair to withhold compensation but also
not in our enlightened self-interest to help ourselves to the valuable
resources of impoverished people without extending them a quid pro quo.
While the political decision in favour of compensation has been taken,
the technical details of how it should be handled are still unclear. What
especially needs unequivocal regulation is who should compensate whom
and how to ensure that remuneration - accruing, for example, from licence
payments by business firms - does not land in the pockets of those who,
because they are politically influential, have ready access to the pot,
while those who the remuneration is meant to help end up empty-handed
once again.
The difficulty of finding a judicious mechanism of compensation is not
so great, however, as to serve as an excuse for delaying tactics by the
creditor camp. One could imagine, for instance, that money designated
for compensation might be funnelled into development co-operation.
What happens if genetically altered, patentable seed gains such a dominant
position of superiority over traditional seed in major Third World crops
that, dictated by overall considerations of what will foster development
best, its broad-scale use has to be recommended? Should this happen, not
only must publicly endowed research in the seeds sector be increased but,
so as to save time, socially compatible ways and means of transferring
technology have also to be sought.
B. Risks rooted
in social inequalities
Living on the land continues to a preponderant extent to mean being poor,
underemployed and uneducated (in the sense of lacking formal schooling).36
So economic and social development, at least as measured by a reduction
in the incidence of rock-bottom poverty, cannot take place on a broad
and lasting basis without adequate rural and agricultural development.
The widespread misunderstanding persists that development is equivalent
to One consequence too low a priority placed on promoting rural and agricultural
attendant underfunding.37 Neglect of extension
services for poor farmers, insufficient provision of working implements,
and a skewed price policy for agricultural products are the most devastating
outcomes of this attitude. At the same time ecological impediments to
development are gaining steadily in significance.38
These deficits all act as hindrances to sustained and socially balanced
rural development.39
From country to country various other factors further complicate the
picture. Wherever unjust social and political power structures determine
the distribution of wealth and income and access to the means of production,
and so deprive people of the possibility of feeding themselves, hunger
is the logical result.
The use of genetically modified seeds adapted to the specific conditions
of difficult biotopes can no doubt provide palpable impulses to agricultural
development. But in a socially and politically defective setting it can
hardly bring about improvements in the condition of the poor. Where land
ownership and tenancy systems, access to extension services, credit, marketing
channels, as well as to new technologies are governed by a socio-political
power structure that favours only a small minority, technological progress
cannot possibly be neutral in impact. The answer to the question who profits
and how much from the advent of new technologies and to what extent hunger
as a development challenge can be overcome depends decisively on the social
and political configuration in place.40 Disease-resistant
cassava, millet richer in protein or rice tolerant to stress can contribute
to a greater food security and prosperity only if these and comparable
social advances come within the reach of the broad mass of the population,
male and female.
In short, the developmental impact of recombinant genetics and biotechnology
is only as good as the socio-political soil in which they are planted.
Any technical advance, progress in genetics included, can only benefit
those who understand the technology and are able to apply it. Every restriction
on access, be it lack of schooling, or feudal power-structures, can have
the effect of aggravating income discrepancies - pronouncedly so when
the technology is very potent. Unless social reforms are introduced and
reinforced with supportive measures that also enable the middle and lower
strata of society to gain their share step by step, technological innovations
actually work against the development goal of breaking down inequalities.
3.2.2. Different
countries - different effects
As a collective term, developing countries is no longer appropriate in
discussions on the social and economic effects of the sophisticated new
technologies. It is too sweeping: it takes in countries so different economically,
socially and culturally, as well as in their capacity to absorb the fruits
of research and technology, as to defy generalizations.
This is why recent studies differentiate more carefully, categorizing
the developing countries on the basis of their research capacity and their
institutional arrangements for stimulating biotechnological development.
Further criteria include the share of agriculture in overall exports,
whether a country is a net exporter or importer of agricultural products,
and how agriculture is structured (importance of large-scale farming as
over against small-holders).41
In their analysis of the effects on agriculture in the developing countries,42
Commandeur and von Roozendaal come to the following conclusions:
- Countries that are both net agricultural exporters and have a weak
technological potential will not be in a position to avail themselves
of biotechnology. Because these countries depend chiefly on exports
of their products they will be affected most negatively.
- Countries that have a weak technological potential but are net importers
of food could profit short-term from lower prices on the world market.
In the long term, however, this trend could adversely affect domestic
food production.
- Countries with a strong technological potential and high food imports
could benefit most from biotechnology, since it could be oriented towards
self-sufficiency.
- Countries with a strong technological potential and high food exports
could benefit from biotechnology by using it to diversify their exports.
- A country's vulnerability to the new technologies is greatest where
a low technological potential coincides with net exports of potentially
substitutable agricultural products. This constellation exists in most
of Sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean.43
Yet that postulate also needs to be qualified. Today we know what sort
of economic, social and environmental policies are best suited to preparing
the way for a higher quality of life for a country's population.44
It is becoming increasingly clear that governance is of paramount importance
here. Governance, the art of political leadership, denotes the manner
in which governments and their agencies exercise power in conducting state
affairs and in dealing with the economic, social and ecological resources
entrusted to them.45 Human and humane development
presupposes a multitude of national and international actions. Technological
innovation is just one stone in a large and complex mosaic. When the masses
of small farmers have access to land, to marketing opportunities, to working
equipment and to fair terms of credit, then the technological component
can engender specially positive socio-political effects and thus serve
to enhance the life quality of the rural population.
Let us note in conclusion that any assessment of the circumstances shaping
development and technology policies necessarily rests on individual and
collective value judgements and on narrower or broader definitions. There
never has been and never will be any such thing as disinterested social
sciences46 - and ditto for technology sciences.
In societies with a plurality of interests and viewpoints divergent opinions
are quite normal and should be treated as such.47
Moreover, the emphases placed when benefits and risks are weighed always
depend on the level of affluence of those doing the weighing. To people
in a poor country the benefits of gene technology may look like being
greater than they do to us, who stand to gain merely some more prosperity
from it at a level that is high to start with. But in Sub-Saharan Africa,
and especially In the Sahel Zone, for instance, genetically improved seed
varieties can mean the difference between passable survival and chronic
starvation.
4.1. social reforms
There are no technical solutions to political and social problems. So
the modernization of agriculture in the Third World, whether by means
of biotechnology or otherwise, will prove socially most consonant if provision
is made from the outset to ensure that all strata of society have reasonable
chances of benefiting. In most of the developing countries social reforms
such as land reform or special support programs for small farmers (male
and female) are therefore an indispensable part of the drive to
modernize. Where modernization moves ahead too quickly and without adequate
social preparation, and where the institutional framework is not aligned
with progress, increased yields cannot be apportioned in a sensible way.
The same applies where the new biotechnologies are used: the principle
of modernization has to go hand in hand with the principle of social balance.
Given the salient importance of recombinant genetics and biotechnology
for agricultural productivity and food security in the developing countries,
however, they must be made more accessible.
Two mutually complementary possibilities can ease the way: more publicly
endowed research in the interest of the developing countries and increased
cooperation with the private sector.
4.2. public research
Basic research aside, at present private industry accounts for most
of the research being done in the field of genetic technology. Whatever
results from such research is thus patentable for commercial purposes,
and consequently often too high-priced for the poor countries. While one
could envision special agreements being worked out for life-saving medicines
- an AIDS vaccine, for example - or for seed varieties vital to survival,
it would be unrealistic to expect private enterprise to forgo market-oriented
pricing of the fruits of its research for charitable reasons. A clear-eyed
scrutiny of numerous companies' research objectives leads one to conclude
that, with a view to optimizing the funds ventured in research, they are
concentrating on problem solutions that can be marketed primarily in the
rich industrial nations, because only these countries have the buying
power needed to bring the return on investment aimed for.
That is the reason why more public research is called for, and above
all in the developing countries, since the results forthcoming from this
source - which, incidentally, ought also to be patented48
- can be turned to use at cost-oriented prices, subsidized or even made
available gratis. In this connection particular mention should be made
of the research institutes of CGIAR, the Consultative Group on International
Agricultural Research. They are attempting to increase the productivity
of diverse tropical systems of cultivation on a sustained basis and without
impairing the environment. Although a number of countries do have an impressive
national engagement in biotechnology research, a great deal more still
needs to be invested.49
If the gap between North and South is not to go on widening endlessly
and the needs of the poor people in the poor countries are not simply
to be forgotten, then together with the aforementioned political and social
reforms public research geared to the specific problems of these people
must be built up in the Third World and supported by international funding.
Failing a substantial reinforcement of international agricultural research,
more and more developing countries with their rapidly growing populations
could already face serious food shortfalls in the next ten years.50
Tragically, the present trend points precisely in this direction. A spreading
swath of budget cuts in practically all of the industrial countries frequently
impacts upon national and international contributions to public research,
an example being the CGIAR program. Over the past two years support for
CGIAR's core program decreased by 21 percent in real terms.51
With a reduction of 31 percent in five years the fall-off for the Group's
four original research centres - IRRI, CYMMIT, IITA and CIAT52
- was even more drastic. The upshot: research centres on whose success
or failure the food security of entire continents could hinge are having
to curtail programs and let staff go.
Expanded research does not signify only expanded scientific research
either. To an ever greater extent it also means research in development
policy and sociology in order to improve the social parameters for technology
transfers and thus pare the social transaction costs.
Finally it should be noted that more community participation is essential
to establishing research priorities. Research policy is still too much
a matter of offers from on high rather than the result of an empirical
analysis of what is needed down below. Systematic use of the instrument
of participatory needs assessment would likely lead to a redirection of
research priorities towards other food crops: yams, manioc/cassava, millet.
It might well also serve to add to our knowledge of sought-after properties
in traditionally cultivated crops.
4.3. stepped-up
collaboration with the private sector
Humane advancement of the present generation and future generations
depends on finding solutions to the problems we have discussed. In most
cases this will necessitate trying out new approaches and forming new,
broader coalitions. Traditional institutional barriers must be surmounted.
Many development projects and programs suffer from problems that could
be better solved or even avoided if the knowledge available within private
enterprise were made use of. Many development organizations are hobbled
not only by hazy guidelines, overlapping areas of responsibilities or
even by a kind of compulsory outflow of funds, but also by a tendency
to re-invent the wheel, as it were. These are all drags on effective performance
and an optimum cost/benefit relationship. A growing body of evidence indicates
that the management quality and the efficiency of humanitarian institutions
depend to a considerable degree on methods and practices that bear a close
resemblance to those common in business and industry.53
Managerial and operational techniques that have proved their worth in
private enterprise - e.g. operational guidelines, job descriptions, personnel
performance appraisals or financial control systems - could contribute
to more rational operations and efficiency and hence to greater effectiveness
in the realm of development co-operation.
The summons to more teamwork goes in the other direction, too. Were the
private sector to become more receptive to the needs of the international
development effort and the international research community, funds already
in short supply and valuable time could be saved, and in addition the
efficiency of international collaboration and of agricultural research
would be boosted. The special knowledge and know-how and the different
experience - and patented intellectual property as well - that are at
the disposal of the private sector but are used only selectively for lucrative
markets in the industrial countries could be passed on via donated transfers
or very favourable licensing terms to public research institutes in developing
countries. This can be done, as a concrete example shows: Ciba has made
available a gene of Bacillus thuringiensis to IRRI, the International
Rice Research Institute.
Concerns about food security for a growing world population have been
part of the social and natural science debate ever since Thomas Malthus
essay in 1798, if not earlier.54 The impressive
aggregate picture of food production over the past three decades seemed
to have driven away fears of famine for many if not most observers. Food
insecurity and its worst manifestation, famine, were much more seen in
terms of poverty and its underlying conditions, than in terms of production
deficits.55 Since the beginning if the nineties,
however, new worries about potential future production deficits are being
voiced with increasing insistence.
The Worldwatch Institute points to a dramatic slowdown in world grain
harvest growth over the last decade largely due to the limited availability
of productive new crop land and of fresh water for irrigation expansion,
and to the declining response of crops to additional fertilizer use56
Grain output alone fell from 1984 until 1993 by 11 percent per person,
other food output per person declined as well and this under conditions,
where - the backlog of unused agricultural technology is shrinking in
industrial and developing countries alike, slowing the rise in cropland
productivity. At the same time, soil erosion, air pollution, soil compaction,
aquifer depletion, the loss of soil organic matter and salting of irrigated
land are all slowing the rise in food output. At present, there is nothing
in sight to reverse the worldwide decline in grain output per person.57
Hence, allons-nous à la famine?58
Or can we assume with some confidence that - once again - yield increasing
technological breakthroughs will help us out?
As said before, dealing with the issues of food security - or, for that
matter, with development problems in general - there is no simple cause-and-effect
nexus. Rather, because they issue from extremely intricate interdependencies
in systems that are difficult to see through, generally applicable approaches
to resolving them do not exist.59 To be sure,
we can discern certain key components, and these will be of prime importance
whatever the case. Today, it is consensus, that - future growth in food
supplies must come from yield-increasing technological change. Expanding
production into new areas has reached its limits. Agriculture has already
moved into marginal zones, including high-altitude watershed zones, drought-
and desertification-prone areas, and rain forests, where sustainable production
is not feasible with current levels of technology and where there are
long-term negative environmental consequences.60
It is also widespread common understanding, that increasing yields per
unit of land will require peaceful conflict resolutions61
and other better ways and means in which political and bureaucratic power
is exercised in the management of a countrys economic, social and ecological
resources for development62, inclusive a
comprehensive package consisting of political changes supportive of agriculture.
In addition, better farm management methods and their effective dissemination
to small farmers are required, as well as improvements in rural infrastructure.63
All efforts could, however, eventually prove to be insufficient without
crop improvement and hence biotechnology and genetic engineering. They
are effective means to increase the efficiency of research and shorten
the time required to generate new varieties. Cooperation with the private
sector and other coalitions against famine could be important unconventional
way to make progress faster and less expensive.
The immense problems burdening people in the impoverished regions of
our planet did not come about overnight, and nor are there any short-term
solutions to them - certainly not from the North alone and with research
results or technical means alone. The socially compatible employment of
recombinant genetics and biotechnology can help significantly to better
the quality of life of the poor in developing countries, provided that
an environment conducive to development is present. In many respects
the conclusions set forth by the Club of Rome in its last report apply
to our discussion:
Living as we do at the onset of the first global revolution, on a small
planet which we seem hell-bent to destroy, beset with conflicts, in an
ideological and political vacuum, faced with problems of global dimensions
which the fading nation states are impotent to solve, with immense scientific
and technological possibilities for the improvement of the human condition,
rich in knowledge but poor in wisdom, we search for the keys to survival
and sustainability.64
Sustainable development - and sustainable food security - will not be
achievable without better governance and a new dimension of solidarity
between the rich and the poor of this world - but also not without new
technologies such as genetic engineering and biotechnology.
References
1See World Bank: World Development Report
1993. Investments in Health. Washington, D.C. 1993. Table 4, p. 296 ff.
2See FAO: Agriculture Towards 2010. 27th Session,
Rome, 6-25 November 1993, p. A17 ff.
3Ibid., p. 105 ff.
4On the population problem see Leisinger, K.M./Schmitt,
K.: All our People. Population Policy
with a Human Face. Island Press, Washington, D.C. 1994.
On the environment problem see: The World Resources Institute (ed.): World
Resources 1994-95. A Guide to the Global Environment. Oxford University
Press, New York 1994.
Von Weizsäcker, E.U.: Erdpolitik. ökologische Realpolitik an
der Schwelle zum Jahrhundert der Umwelt. 3rd, revised printing in softcover,
Darmstadt 1992.
5See FAO: Agriculture: Towards 2010. 27th Session,
Rome, 6-25 November 1993, p. 16.
6Ibid., p. 35 ff.
7Ibid., p. 38.
8FAO: World Food Supplies and Prevalence of
Chronic Undernutrition in Developing Regions as Assessed in 1992. Document
ESS/MISC/1992, Rome 1992.
9Population Reference Bureau (publ.): 1994
World Population Data Sheet. Washington, D.C. 1994.
10As estimated by the Action Group on Food
Security: Feeding 10 Billion People in 2050. The Key Role of the CGIAR's
International Agricultural Research Centres. Washington, D.C., April 20,
1994, p. 3.
11Made up of Robert O. Blake, David E. Bell,
Jessica Tuchman Methews, Robert McNamara, M. Peter McPherson and Montague
Yudelman.
12Action Group on Food Security: Feeding 10
Billion People in 2050. They Key Role of the CGIAR's International Agricultural
Research Centres. Washington, D.C., April 20, 1994, p. 3.
13Ibid.
14See Leisinger, K.M./Schmitt, K.: All
our People. Population Policy with a Human Face. Island Press, Washington,
D.C. 1994.
15See FAO: Agriculture: Towards 2010. 27th
Session, Rome, 6-25 November 1993, p. 119 ff.
16See Leisinger, K.M./Schmitt, K.: überleben
im Sahel. Eine ökologische und entwicklungspolitische Herausforderung.
Birkhäuser Verlag, Basel 1992, Chap. 6.
17Cf. FAO: Yearbook Production. Vol. 44, 1990,
p. 67 ff.
18Extensively discussed in Leisinger, K.M.:
Grüne Revolution: Eine revidierte Beurteilung im Lichte neuer empirischer
Erfahrungen. In: Aussenwirtschaft, 39. Jg., H.IV 1984, pp. 357-381.
Die Grüne Revolution im Wandel der Zeit: Technologische Variablen
und soziale Konstanten. Publ. as Social Strategies Forschungsberichte,
Vol. 2, No. 2, Basel 1987.
19In this paper gene (recombinant DNA)
technology means the calculated modification of hereditary genetic
material in living organisms by the addition, removal or exchange of one
or more genes, resulting in the passing on of this altered genetic information
to descendants.
Cf. Dohmen, K. (ed.): Gentechnologie - die andere Schöpfung? Metzler,
Stuttgart 1988, p. 5.
Biotechnology is the integrated application of biochemistry, microbiology
and process technology with the objective of turning to technical use
the potential of micro-organisms and cell and tissue cultures as well
as parts thereof.
Cf. Dellweg, H.: Biotechnologie, Grundlagen und Verfahren. VCH, Weinheim
1987, p. 1.
Biotechnology therefore deals with the utilization of biological processes
in technical operations and industrial production. Gene technology is
a means to an end, inasmuch as it allows the properties of micro-organisms
to be modified in such a way that a desired effect is brought about in
biological processes, among others. Three different generations
of biotechnology can be distinguished. In the first, bacteria or yeast,
for example, were used in making cheese or bear. In the second, micro-organisms
were used to produce antibiotics and molecular biology was further developed.
In the third generation, finally, it has become possible to alter the
genetic material of an individual cell directly. The combination of all
three generations confers great potential power on biotechnology.
20See OECD: Biotechnology, Agriculture and
Food. Paris 1992.
De Groot, C.: Forestry Biotechnology. In: Biotechnology and Development
Monitor, No. 5, December 1990, p. 20 ff.
21See e.g. Bunders, J.F.G. (ed.): Biotechnology
for small-scale farmers in developing countries. Analysis and assessment
procedures. VU University Press, Amsterdam 1990.
Miflin, B.J.: Plant biotechnology: Aspects of its application to industry.
In: Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Vol. 99b, No. 3/4,
1992, pp. 153-163.
22See Commandeur, P./Komen, J.: Biopesticides:
Options for biological pest control increase. In: Biotechnology and Development
Monitor, No. 14, March 1993, p. 3 ff.
23See Walgate, R.: Miracle or Menace - Biotechnology
and the Third World. Panos Dossier, London 1990, Chap. 9, p. 125 ff.
Bijam, J.: Can biotechnology help to increase livestock productivity?
In: Biotechnology and Development Monitor, No. 5, March 1992, p. 18 ff.
24See e.g. Chen, Z./Gu, H.: Plant Biotechnology
in China. In: Science, Vol. 262, October 15, 1993, p. 377 ff.
25See the report of the Neue Zürcher
Zeitung, July 21, 1993: Gentechnisch veränderte Pflanzen in China.
Modernste Technologie zur Ernährung der Milliarde.
26See Wirtschaftswoche, No. 3, January 14,
1994, p. 78 ff.
27See CGIAR Highlights: Feeding the World
- Protecting the Environment. UN Briefing Co-sponsored by World Bank,
UNDP and FAO. Washington, D.C., May 1992.
Also Moffat, A.S.: Improving Plant Disease Resistance. In: Science, Vol.
257, July 24, 1992.
28Langenbach, J.: Die wichtigsten Projekte
der Biotechnologie. Die Gentechnologie revolutioniert den Gang der biologischen
Forschung. In: Tagesanzeiger, Zürich, January 27, 1992.
Walker, J.M./Gingold, E.B.: Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. The Royal
Society of Chemistry. Reprint, 2nd edition, Cambridge 1992.
29For critical views of gene technology and
biotechnology in relation to the Third World see: Altner, G./Krauth, W./Lünzer,
I./Vogtmann, H. (eds.): Gentechnik und Landwirtschaft. 2nd edition, C.F.
Müller, Karlsruhe 1990.
Studier, A. (ed.): Biotechnologie: Mittel gegen den Welthunger? Schriften
des Deutschen übersee-Instituts, No. 8, Hamburg 1991.
Walgate, R.: Miracle or Menace - Biotechnology and the Third World. Panos
Dossier, London 1990.
Hobbelink, H.: Biotechnology and the Future of World Agriculture. Zed
Books, London 1991.
Fowler, C./Mooney, P.: Shattering - Food, Politics, and the Loss of Genetic
Diversity. The University of Arizona Press, Tucson 1990.
30Regarding the discussion of technology-inherent
risks see Leisinger, K.M.: Gentechnik für die Dritte Welt? Birkhäuser
Verlag, Basel 1991, p. 86 ff. and attached bibliography.
31See World Bank: Global Economic Prospects
and the Developing Countries. Washington, D.C. 1994.
32Cf. Wambui, K.: New Threat to Cash Crops.
In: Sunday Times, Nairobi, November 20, 1989, p. 11.
33See Zweifel, H.: Gentechnologie gegen den
Hunger? In: Der Staatsbürger, No. 5, Zürich 1990, pp. 22-25.
34Cf. Sasson, A.: Biotechnologies and Development.
UNESCO, Paris 1988, pp. 269-276.
Also Jacobson, S./Jamison, A./Rothman, H. (eds.): The Biotechnological
Challenge. Cambridge 1986, p. 96 ff.
Hobbelink, H.: Bioindustrie gegen die Hungernden. Rororo, Reinbek 1989,
p. 46 ff.
35Junne, G.: The Impact of Biotechnology on
International Commodity Trade. In: Da Silva, E.J./Ratledge, C./Sasson,
A. (eds.): Biotechnology: Economic and Social Aspects: Issues for Developing
Countries. Cambridge University Press/UNESCO, Paris 1992, pp. 165-188.
36See Glewwe, P.: Improving Data on Poverty
in the Third World. World Bank Working Papers, WPS 416, Washington, D.C.,
May 1990.
37With few exceptions (e.g. Singapore), in
the absence of a self-sufficient value-creating domestic agricultural
economy industrialization is very difficult, if possible at all.
See Egger, U.: Agrarstrategien in verschiedenen Wirtschaftssystemen. Dissertation,
Institut für Agrarwirtschaft, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
(ETH), Zürich 1993.
38See Leisinger, K.M./Schmitt, K.: überleben
im Sahel. Eine ökologische und entwicklungspolitische Herausforderung.
Birkhäuser Verlag, Basel 1992.
39See Drèze, J./Sen, A. (eds.): The
Political Economy of Hunger. Three volumes, 2nd printing, Clarendon Press,
Oxford 1993.
40Ibid.
41Commandeur, P./von Roozendaal, G.: The Impact
of Biotechnology on Developing Countries. Opportunities for Technology-Assessment
Research and Development Co-operation. A Study Commissioned by the Büro
für Technikfolgen-Abschätzung beim Deutschen Bundestag (TAB).
Bonn 1993, Chap. 3, pp. 49-52.
42Ibid., p. 7.
43Ibid., p. 50 ff.
44See Nohlen, D./Nuscheler, F. (eds.): Handbuch
der Dritten Welt. Grundprobleme - Theorien - Strategien. Verlag J.H.W.
Dietz Nachf., Bonn 1993.
45World Bank: Governance and Development.
Washington, D.C. 1992.
46Myrdal, G.: Asian Drama. An Inquiry into
the Poverty of Nations. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth 1968, p. 32.
47Watzlawick, P. (ed.): Die erfundene Wirklichkeit.
Wie wissen wir, was wir zu wissen glauben? Beiträge zum Konstruktivismus.
Piper, 7th edition, Munich/Zürich 1991.
48See Von Wijk, J./Cohen, J.I./Komen, J.:
Intellectual Property Rights for Agricultural Biotechnology. Options and
Implications for Developing Countries. In: ISNAR
Research Report, No. 3, The Hague, October 1993.
49See Komen, J./Persley, G.: Agricultural
Biotechnology in Developing Countries. A Cross Country Review. In: ISNAR
Research Report, No. 2, The Hague, September 1993.
50See Action Group on Food Security: Feeding
10 Billion People in 2050. The Key Role of the CGIAR's International Agricultural
Research Centres. Washington, D.C., April 20, 1994.
51Ibid., p. 10.
52International Rice Research Institute, Centro
International de Mejoramiento de Maiz y Trigo, International Institute
of Tropical Agriculture and Centro International de Agricultura Tropical.
53See Drucker, P.: Managing the non-profit
organisation. Principles and Practices. Harper Collins Publisher, New
York 1990.
54Malthus, T. R.: An Essay on the Principle
of Population as It Affects the Future Improvement of Society. London
1798. In later editions the title was altered slightly: An Essay on the
Principle of Population or A View on Its Past and Present Effects on Human
Happiness. London 1803, 1807, 1817, and 1826. Mark Perlman found earlier
and better explanations of the Malthusian arguments almost 250 years earlier
in Francesco Botero's publication dating 1558 Delle cause della grandezza
delle cità. See Perlman, M.: Some Economic Growth Problems and
the Part Population Policy Plays. In: Quarterly Journal of Economics,
Vol.LXXXIX, No.2, May 1975, p.248.
55See e.g. Von Braun J.: A Policy Agenda for
Famine Prevention in Africa. Food Policy Report, Washington D.C. (International
Food Policy Research Institute), October 1991.
56Brown L.R./Kane H./Roodman D.M. (Eds.):
Vital signs 1994. The Trends that are Shaping our Future. W.W.Norton &
Company, New York/London 1994, p.18f.
57Brown L.R.: Facing Food Insecurity. In:
Brown L.R. et alia: State of the World 1994, W.W.Norton & Company, New
York/London 1994, p.177ff;
58This question was answered affirmatively
about 30 years ago, before the successes of the Green Revolution set in,
see: Dumont R.: Nous allons à la Famine. Edition Du Sueil, Paris
1966;
59See Drèze, J./Sen, A. (eds.): The
Political Economy of Hunger. Three volumes, 2nd printing, Clarendon Press,
Oxford 1993.
60See Von Braun J./Hopkins R.F./Puetz D./Pandya-Lorch
R.: Aid to Agriculture: Reversing the Decline. Food Policy Report, Washington
D.C. (International Food Policy Research Institute), October 1993.
61See: Pennington G.: Rwanda Civil War disrupts
key African Food Program. In: CIAT International, Vol.13, No.1, May 1994,
p.1f.
62See Leisinger, K.M./Hösle, V. (eds.):
Entwicklung mit menschlichem Antlitz. Beck'sche Reihe, Munich 1995.
63An issue stressed by the World Development
Report 1994 of the World Bank, Oxford University Press 1994.
64King A./Schneider B.: The First Global Revolution.
A Report by the Council of the Club of Rome. Simon & Schuster London 1991,
p.193. |
TOPICS OF INTEREST
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AREAS TO LOOK AT
ERITREA: sustainable
land management.
MALI:
Precad
KENYA: insect
resistant maize improvement.
|
