Posts

Posted on

Golden rice redux

OK. Mea culpa. Jorge Mayer, Manager of the Golden Rice project, rightly took me to task for using out-of-date data about the carotene content of the new generation of Golden Rice. The project’s web site says:

The recommended daily allowance (RDA) of vitamin A for 1-3 year-old children is 300 µg (half the RDA is enough to maintain vitamin A at a normal, healthy level). Based on a retinol equivalency ratio for Beta-carotene of 12:1, half the RDA would be provided in 72 g of the new-generation Golden Rice. This is perfectly compatible with rice consumption levels in target countries, which lie at 100-200 g of rice per child per day.

I confess, I did not find that, as it wasn’t actually my primary concern. My primary concern was to ask whether the approach Golden Rice embodies, its mindset, if you will, is actually going to deliver the goods as effectively as some other approaches. Is it, for example, what vitamin A deficient people would choose for themselves?

The Golden Rice project’s home page says that:

The best way to avoid micronutrient deficiencies is by way of a varied diet, rich in vegetables, fruits and animal products.

The second best approach, especially for those who cannot afford a varied diet, is by way of nutrient-dense staple crops.

It then goes on to explain how some cereals, such as rice, are capable of producing provitamin A in the leaves but not in the grain, because some of the necessary genes are switched off in the grain, and how the inventors of Golden Rice inserted those genes from other species “to account for the turned-off genes”.

So far so good. And maybe that’s as far as things need to go. But here is where I part company from the project.

In the most remote rural areas Golden Rice could constitute a major contribution towards sustainable vitamin A delivery mechanisms. To achieve this goal a strong, concerted, and interdisciplinary effort is needed. This effort must include scientists, breeders, farmers, regulators, policy-makers and extensionists. The latter will play a central role in educating farmers and consumers as to their options. While the most desirable option woud be a varied and sufficient diet, this goal is not always achievable, at least not in the short term. The reasons are manifold, ranging from tradition to geographical and economical limitations. Golden Rice is a step in the right direction in that it does not create new dependencies or displace traditional cuisine.

And right below that paragraph is a crosshead that reads:

Golden Rice will reach those who need it at no additional cost

Note that “consumers” are passive recipients of education. I really do not see the chain that binds Golden Rice to “the most remote rural areas” “at no additional cost”. How are those people going to get their Golden Rice? As a handout, in perpetuity? As a supply of seeds? Furthermore, and this was my original point, if a varied and sufficient diet is the most desirable option, is there not a danger that the inherent sexiness of Golden Rice and the scientific attraction of cutting-edge genetic engineering could possibly be creating a funding well that draws in support to the detriment of that most desirable option? Why, indeed, is that most desirable option not always achievable?

Golden Rice, as a poster child for engineered biofortification, has come a long way. Those promoting it have become much less strident and have sought to build alliances. But I haven’t seen anyone willing to give the most desirable option — a varied and sufficient diet — a fair crack of the whip.

That was my point. I’m happy to concede that Golden Rice could deliver provitamin A. I’m just still not sure it is the best way to do so.

Posted on

Carse of Gowrie gung-ho for old orchards

The Perthshire Advertiser reports on efforts in that neck of the woods to preserve and revitalize old orchards and the varieties they contain. I didn’t know this, but the Carse of Gowrie (which sounds like an ancient honorific title but is, in fact, a stretch of land north of Edinburgh on the north side of the Firth of Tay) is an ancient centre of fruit-growing in Scotland. A joint effort by local authorities and others has conducted a survey and is examining ways of making more of the remaining old orchards — 28 of 51 have already been lost — and their trees. There’s a meeting on 30th January. If anyone there is reading this, we’d love to know more.

Posted on

Gates Foundation doubles aid for agriculture

Bill Gates announced new awards for agriculture totaling US$306 million. This doubles the amount committed to agriculture, and includes US$42.8 over four years to Heifer International. Interesting in light of the impact of “improved” cows on local livestock breeds. There’s also money for AGRA to improve soil health, to CARE for dairy farmers in Bangladesh, and to TechnoServe to help East African farmers get more for their coffee. The Foundation’s press release is here. New York Times article.

Posted on

Animal Genetic Resources on the ground in Uganda

A dying breed. Huge article in the New York Times magazine that looks at the general issue of disappearing livestock diversity through the particular lens of cattle in Uganda, where the local Ankhole cattle are threatened by high-yielding but fragile Holsteins. All the arguments and counter-arguments are there in a well-written piece that pulls no punches and yet, in the end, left me wondering what the solution is. Farmers who do use Holsteins profit thereby, setting off an arms race among fellow farmers, whose primary victim is the local livestock breeds. But when trouble strikes, in the form of drought or civil strife, it is the local breeds that gallop back to the rescue. As long as they remain alive …

Posted on

Time for a test?

A few things have come together at the same time in that serendipitous way that makes me value even more the pattern detecting abilities of dear old Homo sapiens. First, I blog a feature that takes quite a close look at what the Gates Foundation is trying to do with (for?) agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa. Then I read a post from Marcelino over at Biopolitical arguing that the best way to help the poor may be to give them money. And finally, Karl over at The Inoculated Mind, introducing our post on high-carotene maize, says this: “Grrr, the opposition to humanitarian efforts such as golden rice sure gets my blood boiling … perfect for this weather”.

And I think, hmmmn, I feel a hypothesis creeping up on me.

Let’s go back first to Marcelino. He quotes Robin Hanson, an economist, who says:

A suspiciously large fraction of people who claim to care about the third world poor believe that the best way to help is to pursue their favorite hobby or career, and not to just give the poor money. Medical researchers seek disease cures, computer folk build laptops or subversive software, musicians hold concerts to inspire donations, policy wonks lobby governments to build schools, and so on.

That certainly seems true of the Golden Rice effort. The reasons it is unlikely to help the third world poor are many. Even the new improved version does not contain very much in the way of vitamin A precursors; you would have to eat an awful lot of it each day — probably an amount impossible to ingest in a day — to overcome the levels of malnutrition seen among the poorest children. The people who need it most are not going to be able to afford it — indeed, they are often out of the cash economy completely. And as for giving them seed and expecting them to grow it, their effort would probably be much more successful ploughed into more diversity in their fields and in their diets. Dark green leafy veg and orange fruits could make a much greater contribution than golden rice.

So the idea that Golden Rice was created, or given away, to help the third world poor does seem a little far-fetched. At the very least, the idea wasn’t thought through very carefully.

Then there’s the Gates Foundation’s support for agricultural research, which to me on the outside often seems to be suspiciously like using the previous generation’s weapons to fight the generation before that’s battles. Now, Gates wants results, and he wants impact. So, why not let two (or more) methods fight head to head?

Take two villages, or even two countries. Give one a bunch of cash to spend with scientists and others solving problems in a genuinely participatory way, trying some weird stuff (like agricultural biodiversity) along the way. For the other, put the usual advice to work in the usual ways. Give them both, say, five years. Then see which has improved most.

Simplistic, I know, but what, actually, is wrong with the idea? Smart people (not just me) are criticizing current approaches with sensible suggestions. Humour them, listen to them, do the experiment; then one way or another we’ll know. And smart people, as opposed to those who merely have an axe to grind, will change their opinion based on the results.

Something like this could have been tried with the Millennium Villages, but as far as I know it hasn’t. I wonder what would happen if you created the equivalent of a voucher system for research and development, and gave poor people in rural areas a choice of how to use their vouchers.