Science and technology have been the foundation of the social and economic gains made in agriculture over the past 30 years and will continue to underpin any necessary
increases in agricultural productivity. Plant biotechnology is one such technology that has
been regarded as part of the “sustainable productivity equation” in agriculture (Cohen, 2001). Its present applications in agriculture include conventional breeding, tissue culture and micropropagation, molecular breeding or marker-assisted selection, plant disease diagnostics, genetic engineering and the production of GM crops, and the “omics” sciences (e.g., genomics,
proteomics, metabolomics, etc.). Unfortunately, harnessing biotechnology and its
applications for the benefit of the poor will require considerable attention in many areas including: allocation of additional public resources to agricultural research; appropriateness of, and access to, biotechnology by resource-poor farmers; improvement in the seed distribution
and extension systems; capacity-building of the public sector in biotech R&D; public education; policies and regulatory frameworks on biosafety, food safety, and intellectual property rights (IPRs); and stronger public-private sector links for both international and local collaborative undertakings. Current Status of Plant Biotechnology in Asia Many Asian governments—including China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam— have given high priority to plant biotechnology research in the hope of addressing the pressing challenges related to improving productivity, farmers’ livelihoods, driving rural development, and meeting food
security demands.
