Agricultural Great Reset: Crop Gene Editing Can Help Fight Food Insecurity, Experts Claim

Using gene editing to make more resilient crops could help in the fight against food insecurity, proponents of the technque have told British ministers.

Gene editing — a somewhat controversial technique involving the manipulation of plants to promote desirable properties — could help boost crop resilience, and by extension fight food insecurity, a number of experts have told ministers in Britain.

Such experts now want to see the technology adopted across the United Kingdom, with Westminster having already signalled a certain degree of approval for the accelerated method of traditional plant cultivation in this month’s Queen’s Speech.

According to a report by The Times, proponents of gene editing are now looking to get Scotland’s devolved government to warm to the tech, which they believe would lower costs to farmers while bumping production.

“…we need to develop crops quickly which can adapt and are resistant to climate change and pests and whose cultivation is more environmentally friendly,” said Professor Lesley Torrance of the James Hutton Institute, who backed a planned Westminster bill that would force the Scots to accept the use of the method north of the internal UK border.- READ MORE