To support and advance sustainable agriculture, we advocate the role of agricultural innovations in plant biotechnology.
As one of the most carefully regulated industries in the world, the biotech sector’s products must meet an exhaustive series of regulatory requirements to ensure environmental and human safety before being released onto the market.
The responsible and sustainable use of biotechnology requires sound regulation and proper stewardship. We, MCPA with CropLife International support a global, innovation-friendly regulatory environment – one that is predictable, transparent, and guided by good science. Science-based regulation is the most effective way to ensure farmers have the choice of the best available technologies to help them meet their own agricultural needs in a sustainable way.
We work closely with international institutions and governments to ensure the introduction of transparent, workable standards based on sound science and risk assessments that are harmonised where possible.
Farmers have been using breeding techniques for thousands of years to genetically modify crops to improve their quality and yield. By using modern biotechnology, plant breeders are able to select genes that produce beneficial traits and move them from one organism to another. Plant biotechnology is far more precise and selective than crossbreeding in producing desired agronomic traits. To learn more about the benefits and positive impacts of plant biotechnology, do lookout for then in our updated Plant Biotech 101 handout.
Plant biotechnology has been adopted by farmers worldwide at a rate never before seen by any other advances in the history of agriculture. According to the latest report from the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), in 2019 alone, biotech crops were grown by 17 million small farmers on 190.4 million hectares in 29 countries. The reason for such impressive adoption rates is simple — plant biotechnology delivers significant and tangible benefits, all the way from the farm to the fork.
For more information, please visit the GMO Answers website, an initiative committed to responding to your questions about how food is grown. Its goal is to make information about biotech crops in food and agriculture easier to access and understand.
Learn more about these benefits in the infographic below.
