"Our farmers have shown that they are capable of more than meeting our food needs. Let the government incentivize agriculture that is good for the consumer and the environment,” stated Dilnavaz Variava, former chief executive officer of WWF-India and vice president of Bombay Natural History Society at a seminar organized by the Council for Fair Business Practices (CFBP) on February 7, 2013 at the Indian Merchants’ Chamber in Bombay. The theme of the seminar was "Genetically modified crops: What should a consumer know and do?” which addressed fears prevalent about such foods. Shaheen Contractor sent a write-up on the event to Parsiana by email.
Concurring with Variava, India’s well-known agricultural policy analyst Devinder Sharma said "growing hunger is not because of any shortfall in food production but because of food management.” According to him, the food produced globally in 2012 was enough to feed twice the existing population of seven billion, being enough to meet the requirements of 13 billion people. "At every conference that I have attended, the same sets of statistics are flashed to justify the commercialization of GM (genetically modified) crops.” Sharma observed, "On January 1, 2013, India had 66 million tonnes of surplus food stocks. While visuals of food rotting in godowns are fresh in memory, the government has been merrily exporting the surplus rather than feeding its hungry millions. This fiscal, wheat exports are expected to touch 9.5 million tonnes, and rice exports have already crossed nine million tonnes in 2011-12.” Neither crop was grown with GM seeds.
Variava detailed how GM foods could be detrimental to the environment. Most GM crops are modified for two traits — herbicide tolerance and insect resistance. Studies by weed experts had found that due to the former the herbicide tolerating gene was being inadvertently transferred to weed in the USA, and insects are growing resistant due to the latter. Other studies show that there have been outbreaks of secondary pests on GM crops, a problem which did not exist earlier. Also, pesticide consumption is higher in GM than in non GM crops, the write-up mentions, with beneficial soil microbes, insects, birds and water quality being affected as well. Ecologically sound agriculture is beneficial to consumers, the environment and small farmers Variava asserted.
Hoshang Billimoria, president, CFBP and Shyamnivas Somani, chairman, programs committee also stressed the importance of the topic while in closing Indrani Malkani appreciated the initiative taken by CFBP to increase awareness among consumers, the write-up notes.