Plant Biotechnology in Africa
I starting reading the next chapter on Sub-Saharan Africa and found an interesting website about malnutrition in Africa. Malnutrition is a common problem throughout the region of Africa. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 40-50 percent of the southern African population is malnourished every year and that the regoing is "worse of nutritionally today that it was 30 years ago." For this reason people are looking at different ways in which Africa could be able to produce a greater amount of food. Some belive that something called "plant biotechnology" is the answer. Plant Biotechnology can help produce a greater amount of food. Plant biotechnolgy helps develop crops with specific beneficial traits without undesirable trades. Favorable traits incude creating plants that fight pests such as insects, disease, and weeds. It also can produce more quality food items. To meet with the growing number of people in our world, in about 30 or 40 years, we would need double the land for agriculture. The first website is very interesting and includes some starteling facts. In my opinion, plant biotechnology is the answer to creating more productive crops not only for Africa, but for the world in the years to come.
posted by Anonymous @ 3/11/2006 01:05:00 PM
1 Comments:
I think the idea of plant biotechnology is a good one and is something that scientists should look toward. I personally believe it's amazing that we can actually engineer food to be a certain way. If we can do that in Africa, would it be possible for us to modify different types of plant foods that we eat to give us some desirable traits? Like the article says, 40% of people in South Africa are not getting enough nutrients and this is not good. I think starting this now would be most beneficial before we start to see an un meetable need for certain types of agriculture in 30-40 years.
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