Present Status and Future of Transgenic Crops in Bangladesh

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Present Status and Future of Transgenic Crops in
Bangladesh

• Role of different International Organizations in
  making GM
• crops acceptable

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Urgent need to educate the public about GM and
future promise

• Responsibility of molecular breeders, concerned
  biologists to educate public, policy makers,
  journalists through dialogue on the following
• GM crops are no different from varieties of
  crops released in market from time to time.
• Consumers never question these crops although
  some of these might contain harmful elements.
  They are not subject to scrutiny as much as GM.
• Mol. Breeders only quicken the process which
  nature takes sometimes thousands of years e.g.
  bread wheat from inter-generic crosses

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Biotechnology in operation in Nature from C. S.
Prakash, Plant Physiology 2001.Tomato and maize
developed from heir respective ancestors
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Public awareness (continued)

• The question is whether GM production should be
  stopped in the face of vehement opposition by
  activist groups.
• World population expected to increase to 8.3
  billions within 2025 and crop production by the
  existing methods cannot cope to feed the extra
  mouths. The other alternative is to resort to
  molecular breeding and subjecting every newly
  engineered crop to screen for allergen and other
  harmful effects.

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Public awareness (continued)

• Public should be apprised that GM antagonists do
  not oppose so eloquently GM drugs human insulin,
  interferon, vaccines.
• Public should be aware that Europe can afford to
  boycott GM food because they produce enough food
  thru conventional methods to feed their
  population. So they are not prepared to take the
  risk even it is infinitesimally small.
• Developing countries cannot afford to follow that
  path for the sake of food security for everybody.
  Public should not oppose any variety released
  after thorough screening by the bio-safety com.

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Thirteen articles published in Plant Physiology
on different aspects of GM crops

• Thirteen articles describing GM crops from
  different perspectives in different issues of
  Plant Physiol. (2000-01) compiled with an
  excellent editorial by Natasha Raikhel.
• This is a invaluable source of information to
  those with GM crops.
• Two articles by Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug and
  CS Prakash deserve special mention.

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OsVNHX1gene isolated for Nipponbare

• OsVNHX1gene is an antiporter gene. It removes
  excess NaCl from the cytoplasm by sequestering
  it in the vacuole.
• Driven by CaMV promoter
• It was isolated by Dr. Noorain Rasul
• Tomato and Brassica plants transformed with this
  gene can tolerate up to 200 mM level of sodium
  salts.

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Use of some other genes for salt tolerance
collaboration with other labs

• The gene PgNHX which imparts salt tolerance was
  obtained (ICGEB). This gene was isolated from
  millet, Penisetum glaucum.
• Successfully inserted by Serajs gp.
• Their efficacy has been demonstrated in Tobacco
  by Dr. Soporys group at ICGEB.

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Search for a better promoter to replace CaMV
promoter

• Since expression of OsNHX1 in transformants with
  CaMV was weak, rice actin promoter (Cornell) was
  used to replace CaMV promoter.
• Three transformants were obtained with insertion
  of the actin promoter. They proved to be GUS
  positive.
• Tolerance of transgenics to be tested at the
  level of 0.5 salt

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Salt tolerant lines derived from anther culture

• Salt tolerant plants were obtained through anther
  culture of salt tolerant variety IR52724. Pokkali
  was one of the donor parents. It is photoperiod
  insensitive and high yielding.
• The plants are now on the 7th generation of trial
  and being screened at Satkhira where salt level
  on the rice-grown soil at certain season rises
  quite high.
• Soon a marker to screen salt tolerant individuals
  will be used at the seedling stage

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Collaboration with other labs

• Helicase gene was obtained from Dr. Narendra
  Tuteja of ICGEB, Delhi.
• This gene indirectly enhances salt tolerance
  capacity by improving transcription efficiency.
• In tobacco CaMV promoter driven glyoxalase gene I
  and II have been shown to also increase salt
  tolerance capacity in the transgenic crops.

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Work in other labs

• Dr. Haseena Khans lab has been doing commendable
  work on jute transformation. Their latest
  breakthrough is to come up with a protocol to
  eliminate chimera which has in the past baffled
  any attempt to obtain transformants.
• Mol. Biol lab in Botany have been working for
  quite sometime on legume transformation system
  and their recent progress is satisfactory.
  Professor Jacobsen has been helping them since
  the inception of the program.

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Work in other lab (contd.)

• Dr. K. Sathasivan, myself and student associates
  have been working on cDNA and genomic library
  construction of the two species of jute,
  Corchorus olitorius and C. capsularis.
• We have already isolated a few genes, our
  ultimate objective being to 4CL gene.

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Bt cotton varieties grown in 9 countries

• A couple of years ago, Bt cotton varieties were
  grown in 9 countries Argentina, Australia,
  Colombia, China, India, Indo- nesia, Mexico, USA,
  South Africa. It was planted in over 13 billion
  acres of land.
• Time is rife now to try Bt cotton in order to
  provide raw cotton to the textile mills in
  Bangladesh. At present pests such as pink
  bollworm sometimes wipe out the entire crop.

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Advantage of planting Bt cotton

• Environment friendly because use of pesticides is
  reduced by 50.
• Increased yield because of less mortality in the
  population.
• Benefits to the resource poor farmers who will
  find more time to earn some exta money women in
  the family will have more time to attend to their
  children.

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Glu (glutamate) dehydrogenase reduces fertilizer
requirement

• Insertion of glu dehydrogenase gene in wheat will
  reduce the fertilizer dosage for the same amount
  of yield. (yield increase by 29).
• It took 35 years to release lysine and tyrosine
  rich maize variety after opaque-2 gene was
  discovered. Now it would take 5 years to
  accomplish the same objective.

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The gene(s) that confer resistanceto rust in
rice

• All indica and japonica rice varieties are immune
  to various rust races caused by Puccinia spp.
  while cereals barley, maize, millets, oat,
  sorghum are susceptible to this highly dangerous
  pathogen.
• Bioengineering the susceptible cereals with the
  rust resistant gene(s) from rice will save the
  resource-poor world population from hunger.

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Commendable effort of ABSPII

• To introduce virus free papaya produced jointly
  by Cornell University and Hawaii scientists in
  Bangladesh
• Imagine every homestead garden and school
  compound growing healthy hermaphrodite papaya
  plants. Apart from a source of income it will
  provide nutritional requirement of the family.
  School children are also benefited from such a
  enterprise.

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BARIs effort to introduce stem-borer resistant
egg plants

• BARI deserves our congratulations for conducting
  trial of stem borer resistant egg plants.
• In order to popularize this GM vegetable, dialog
  should begin between GM supporters and
  antagonists so that farmers are ready to plant
  the variety without loss of time.

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The role of International Service for Acquisition
of Agri-biotech Application (ISAAA)

• The literature provided by ISAAA gives an
  excellent survey of various aspects of GM crops
  covering the scenario of the whole world and
  relevant issues such as biosafety regulations as
  formulated in the Cartagena Protocol.
• Now what is needed most is to write a brief
  illustrated cartoon with a brief description of
  each in simple easy-to-understand language for
  the comprehension of semi-illiterate farmers so
  that they can face the activists with courage and
  conviction. Video will still be better for the
  rapid dissemination of knowledge of GM crops

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SABP is doing a praiseworthy job to apprise
public about biosafety rules

• SABP is giving the country their valuable service
  by training our scientists and holding a number
  of workshops to educate concerned scientists
  policy makers about biosafety rules (BR) and
  their application.
• Their relentless efforts would soon result n both
  enactment of BR and their immediate enforcement.

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One of the objectives of GNOBB is to popularize
GM crops

• The GNOBB forum greatly appreciates the programs
  launched by ISAAA, ABSPII ad SABP. One of its
  policies is to popularize GM crops and bring to
  the attention of Forum members and its browsers
  the activities of ABSPII, ISAAA and SABP.
• The forum also wants to popularize fish-,
  animal-, and vaccine biotech.

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To put pressure upon GoB to build NIB to a center
of excellence

• Recent visit to NIB has convinced me that no
  substantial work is possible at that center by
  the present setup.
• Appointment of senior staff scientists offering
  them fringe benefits besides their regular
  salaries in the prescribed government scale.
• Alternatively to partner with BRAC or other NGOs.
• To work for the Millennium Institute in response
  to their invitation to TWAS countries