Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

Gary Nabhan has had a letter published in the Christmas edition of The Economist.

SIR – Your otherwise excellent leader on adapting to climate change was marred by the assertion that people should abandon their “prejudice” against genetic engineering in order to secure food supplies (“How to live with climate change”, November 27th). Although it is true that drought-resistant seeds will be needed—as will low-chill fruit trees and root crops—they are not likely to come from genetic engineering. This is because it can cost up to $5m and take up to 15 years of R&D for each new patented biotech cultivar. It is unlikely that genetically engineered organisms can be deployed quickly enough to respond to climate change.

It would be far more cost-effective to support local farmers in their breeding and evaluation of selected varieties already in community seed banks. The diversity of heirloom seeds offers rural communities far more pragmatic options than the Gates Foundation and Monsanto can generate with all their wealth.

Gary Paul Nabhan
Professor, University of Arizona, Tucson

Carol Thompson
Professor, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff

I won’t comment on the GMO angle, except to say that Gary’s point is debatable. What I wanted to point out is that it’s not just “community seed banks” that house the seeds of adaptation to climate change. ¹ National and, in particular, international genebanks will also be important. That’s because the climates experienced by rural communities in the future will increasingly come to resemble those experienced in the past by communities further and further away. Adaptation will lie in other people’s seeds.