I wonder if the actual issues with this rice are similar to the miracle rice programs of the '70s where western aid programs introduced commercial strains of rice to traditional farmers in Indonesia and other SE Asian countries. These strains promised higher yield but at the cost of buying in commercial fertilisers and herbicides. The side effect of higher rice yield was disappearance of fish and companion/accidental crops that would typically grow in the rice paddies, along with poisoning of rivers downstream due to excess nutrients from fertilised rice paddies.
..The Government of India signed an agreement with the Rockefeller Foundation to carry out research to achieve higher food production. The program started with research for the development of suitable hybrids of maize followed by hybrids of sorghum and pearl millet.
The dwarf wheat bred by Dr. Borlaug in Mexico, named Sonaro 4 and Larmarojo, were introduced. These efforts created an agricultural revolution.
I consider myself a farmer and used to grow wheat on 80 acres. I was very happy to harvest about 500 quintals every year – about six quintals (600 kg) for every acre. The planting of Sonaro 64, with the agronomic practices recommended, led to a harvest of 20 quintals (2000 kg) an acre, which was more than three times the previous yield.
I remember three to four years after the introduction of those seeds, India’s wheat production expanded significantly, and quite rapidly India became self-sufficient in food.
> "The green revolution has won a temporary success in man's war against hunger and deprivation; it has given man a breathing space. If fully implemented, the revolution can provide sufficient food for sustenance during the next three decades. But the frightening power of human reproduction must also be curbed; otherwise the success of the green revolution will be ephemeral only. Most people still fail to comprehend the magnitude and menace of the "Population Monster"...Since man is potentially a rational being, however, I am confident that within the next two decades he will recognize the self-destructive course he steers along the road of irresponsible population growth..."
Finding out the author of this quote is left as an exercise to the reader...
The green revolution of India was primarily because of newer strain of crops and mechanisation to some degree. Chemical industry simply was not mature enough in 50s to have been a major factor.
I can corroborate this. My family was involved in a chemical manufacturing business in India from the 60s onwards. My understanding from what my family tells me is that the 80s and early 90s is when a lot of these base manufacturing inputs became readily available.
interesting (!) good to put details on the general trends. crop type, latitude and elevation, proximity to rail and other industrial infrastructure, market economics with demographics.. more? all would inform this crucial and interdependent topic
Well, the article does not mentioned anything about second order effects of the use of fertilisers and herbicides that happened 50 years ago in another country so I am going with: No.
Buying seed and fertilizer and pesticides from another country is almost the same as importing the food directly. You have a poor country that is struggling to export products and then you tell it to import even more? Recipe for disaster.
You raise a good point regardless. The trust in science and technology is gone. We’ve been bamboozled so many times that we first see new developments with mistrust instead of wonder.
A device that can bring surveillance and social media and its accompanying society-breaking stressors to him at any place and time in an unceasing torrent of shit...
I understand that the deal is that "golden rice" is a low-maintenance GMO crop whose purpose is to get a foot in the door for other GMO crops, with all the issues that you mentioned.
