The contribution of transgenic plants to better health through improved nutrition: opportunities and constraints

Abstract

Malnutrition is a prevalent and entrenched global socioeconomic challenge that reflects the combined impact of poverty, poor access to food, inefficient food distribution infrastructure, and an over-reliance on subsistence mono-agriculture. The dependence on staple cereals lacking many essential nutrients means that malnutrition is endemic in developing countries. Most individuals lack diverse diets and are therefore exposed to nutrient deficiencies. Plant biotechnology could play a major role in combating malnutrition through the engineering of nutritionally enhanced crops. In this article, we discuss different approaches that can enhance the nutritional content of staple crops by genetic engineering (GE) as well as the functionality and safety assessments required before nutritionally enhanced GE crops can be deployed in the field. We also consider major constraints that hinder the adoption of GE technology at different levels and suggest policies that could be adopted to accelerate the deployment of nutritionally enhanced GE crops within a multicomponent strategy to combat malnutrition.

Next Generation Plant Biotechnology

“…Genetic engineering has been employed for fortification of minerals, amino acids, anti-oxidants, vitamins for improving the nutritional quality of the staple crops. Biofortified crops can alleviate essential micronutrient malnutrition in the human population, particularly in the developing countries (Mayer et al 2008;Hirschi 2009;Beyer 2010;Bashir et al 2013;Murgia et al 2013;Pérez-Masscot et al 2013;Saltzman et al 2013;Zhu et al 2007Zhu et al , 2013. More than 50 % of the human population worldwide has little or no access to healthy staple fresh foods (Christou and Twyman 2004).…”

Food security: intensification of agriculture is essential, for which current tools must be defended and new sustainable technologies invented

“…How it is used is not a problem of the technology, nor can it be of any generic set of methods. This is not to suggest that breeding itself is not moving forward to wider crosses and, reduced linkage drag (Harper et al 2011), but using a gene sequence, even from another kingdom, is only feasible at present by GM (Jones 2011;P erez-Massot et al 2013), a spectacular achievement that must offer immense value in the quest for novel crop traits. In spite of most of the world subscribing to a relatively free market economy, meaning that technology is transferred in some degree by private enterprise, those that violently and illegally seek to prevent, and those that offer tacit support for prevention of, developments in GM promote its commercialization by large multinational industries, because the excessive security that such activities require will detract from state sector activities in this area.…”

“…Nevertheless, the very fact that we now have the prospect of producing a fish oil, having even higher levels of long chain x-3-polyunsaturated fatty acids than cod liver oil, in an oilseed crop (Ruiz-Lopez et al 2013), potentially as an alternative to a dwindling natural resource, and an insect pheromone in wheat (Pickett et al in press), potentially as a means of controlling an insect pest by using genetic code from well beyond the crop plants themselves, a task impossible by breeding, demonstrates the enormous potential of these techniques. This is not to suggest that breeding itself is not moving forward to wider crosses and, reduced linkage drag (Harper et al 2011), but using a gene sequence, even from another kingdom, is only feasible at present by GM (Jones 2011;P erez-Massot et al 2013), a spectacular achievement that must offer immense value in the quest for novel crop traits. New opportunities, in terms of technology developments, are proceeding rapidly, specifically with various techniques for genome engineering (Curtin et al 2012;Li et al 2012;Gaj et al 2013).…”

The expression of heterologous Fe (III) phytosiderophore transporter HvYS1 in rice increases Fe uptake, translocation and seed loading and excludes heavy metals by selective Fe transport

“…Fe is also loaded into the seed endosperm to support germination (Lanquar et al ., ) and thus becomes available as a micronutrient for humans. Rice is an important staple food crop, particularly in the developing world, but rice grains do not accumulate high levels of Fe, leading to severe Fe deficiency in populations that rely mostly on rice for their nutritional needs (Gómez‐Galera et al ., ; Pérez‐Massot et al ., ).…”