Karnataka - Bangalore

BT regulatory Bill in final stages, says Swaminathan

— Photo: Bhagya Prakash K.

EXPERT ADVICE: M.S. Swaminathan, scientist, at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore on Wednesday.

Bangalore: A Bill to regulate the use of genetically modified products is in the final stages of discussion, agricultural scientist M.S. Swaminathan has said. “The Bill will hopefully be tabled in Parliament in the forthcoming monsoon session,” he said.

Dr. Swaminathan was talking to reporters on the sidelines of a lecture on “the scientific management of the impact of climate change on agriculture” here on Wednesday.

The National Biotechnology Regulatory Bill has been drafted after a two-year long process. Once passed, the Bill seeks to set up an autonomous regulatory authority to control the research, manufacture and trade of biotechnology products.

Earlier, delivering the Centenary lecture organised at the Indian Institute of Science, Dr. Swaminathan said climate change, with the associated rise in temperature, change in rainfall patterns and the likelihood of floods especially in the Indo-Gangetic plain, was bound to impact the lives and livelihoods of India’s 115 million farmers.

The cultivation of certain crops could suffer with temperature rise, he said.

“For instance we are the second largest producers of potato in the world, producing 28 million tonnes annually. This high productivity has been made possible by developing varieties that grow in the plains. With temperature rise however, all this could change.”

He said: “We would soon have no choice but to produce more with less. Productivity will have to be increased but without the ecological fallouts seen during the green revolution.”

He said that while organic farming could achieve this balance to a certain extent, “green farming,” which allows for a minimal use of pesticide, chemical fertilizer and genetically modified crops, would be a more “feasible” option for farmer families in India.

The enormous statistics of malnourishment in the country arise not out of the unavailability of food but because of the lack of purchasing power, Prof. Swaminathan said.

“A majority of the consumers in India happen also to be producers of food. One of the most urgent tasks at hand is to increase income in the agricultural sector,” he said. “The rural urban divide can only be broken if we have a scientific and technological upgrading of agriculture,” he said.

“While one section of India is ‘shining’, another section, rural India is suffering. This is not conducive to either social or economic stability,” he added.

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