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Advisory / BIOTECHNOLOGY

Biotechnology: need to do the needful


With bio-technology, we can successfully take on the challenges of hunger, malnutrition, diseases and serious illness. Through it we can isolate a particular gene (trait) in one organism, remove it, and then transfer it to another organism, where this same gene replicates itself, creating a stronger and more resilient strain of the same substance.

Biotechnology offers tremendous opportunities for exponential growth of agriculture. For production of rapid and high quality planting material, currently three advance technologies are being applied successfully in the world: Plant tissue culture (PTC) technology; hybrid seed production technology; seedling production technology.
Among the various biotechnologies, plant tissue culture (PTC) also called as micro- propagation technology is most successful and widely used discipline. PTC offers tremendous opportunities for plant improvement. It is only through the process of micropropagation that PTC has attained the status of industrial technology.

There are several distinct advantages in commercial production of plants through micropropagation over conventional methods. Micropropagated plants are raised under sterile conditions that exclude disease causing organisms, and induce rapid multiplication, maintaining clonal and phenotypic uniformity among the offspring, and conservation of space, round the year production,

Breeding new plant varieties is a necessity but it is a slow and costly process. However, by selecting individual high yielding plants from within crop population and applying micropropagation technique, entire crop can be produced with the premium qualities of original parent plant.

Hybrid seeds embody an improvement over conventional seeds in terms of qualities such as yield and disease resistance. They are developed by crossing parent lines. Seeds produced from hybrids tend to revert back to either of the original parent lines, losing desirable qualities of hybrid. This compels farmers to sow hybrids every time for similar results. Development of new hybrids is research-intensive having long gestation periods of 5-8 years.

Multiplication of hybrids is a labour-intensive process, normally done by contract farming. It requires a careful monitoring to ensure genetic purity. Hybrid seed is high-valued alternative for conventional seed. For high-technology cropping systems, where timing and quality is a critical management factor, hybrid seed provides faster emergence, more rapid initial growth and healthy product.

Planting material with faster emergence, more rapid and uniform initial growth, certified, virus-free and disease indexed, vigorous and healthy growth ensure the successful transplantation and high yield. Among the agriculture inputs, planting material (seed/seedlings) quality is extremely important and a decisive factor for optimum yield. Use of un-hygenic, unknown and poor quality planting material results drastic yield losses. Although seedling production has gained a status of huge industry the world over, but in Pakistan availability of certified, high quality, disease and virus-free planting material at cost effective prices is not possible, which is one of the root-causes of low agriculture productivity, because so far no scientifically compatible system is existing in the country.

Plant tissue culture industry is in fact one of the recognised global profit-making options. It is estimated that there is a world market potential of 15 billion US dollars per year for the tissue culture products. Among the South Asian countries, India has developed PTC as a large industry. Being labour-intensive, production of plant tissue culture is expected to shift from developed countries to the developing countries.
Developing countries are facing the prospects of stagnant or even declining area under cultivation and rising population. This exerts pressure on existing land to increase the yield. Diminishing returns from inputs such as fertilisers, farm equipments and irrigation limit productivity growth. Therefore, improving yield by adopting hybrids remains the only solution to increase per captia agricultural production and improve nutrition levels.
Keeping in view the technical and commercial status of PTC at global level, the situation of Pakistan with the world scenario is miserably poor and of least commercial significance. Pakistan enjoys a unique advantage in setting up micropropagation industry with its rich land resources spread over diverse agro-climate zones, profuse solar radiation throughout the year, good quality water, availability of skilled manpower as well as labour at much cheaper rate.

In Pakistan, almost all PTC laboratories are in public sector and universities. Despite noticeable contribution in basic research in PTC technology, commercial exploitation remains insignificant. Most of the research work conducted in universities or research institutions has not been developed beyond laboratory level achievements. Generally, research in Pakistan is based on public funds and the interest of research laboratories does not match with those of industry or the results are technically immature.
Ironically, no commercially viable plant tissue culture laboratory has been established in private sector, all over the country. However, Agriculture Biotechnologies Pakistan (Pvt) Ltd., is operating in the field of micropropagation and seed production since 1995 to achieve the excellence in high tech agriculture.

Horticulture is another important sector still untapped, although Pakistan has spectacular competitive advantages in this field both for domestic and global market. On export scene a positive trend is observed in fruits and to a certain extent in vegetable, however, our floriculture sector is totally neglected specifically for export marketing. A tremendous amount of effort is needed to develop trend in advance, export-oriented floriculture to tap the unlimited scope in export marketing.
The world market in floriculture is estimated at US $ 50 billion and has been fast growing. Major portion of the demand is from the developed western countries, where cultivable land is limited. Pakistan, with large land mass and good climatic conditions is better placed to benefit from floriculture.

Another issue of great concern is absence of bio-safety laws in Pakistan as there are no laws to protect the right of researchers and anybody can steal new seeds, breeds and technologies developed by the domestic scientists. Other SAARC countries, including Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India, have already given approval to such laws. No biotechnology development can work in the absence of these laws which are meant to govern the technology. On the other hand, there would be no foreign investment and other activities by any of the multinational companies in the agriculture until and unless these laws are made effective in the country.

For future economic uplift, it is not wise to fully rely on the low-tech industrial set-up which is unable to sustain in high competitive global market system. It becomes essential now to embark on other potential resources like agriculture. Biotechnology in this regard is a revolutionary and accessible concept which can boost the agriculture and overall economy of the country
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 Nation 28 January  2002