By John Krebs

If famine-hit Africa is to benefit from the new foodstuffs, Europeans must
accept them. Here's how they might be persuaded
As you leave Oxford station heading for London, there is an Oxfam advert
that says: ?Thanks to rising prices, some people can't afford fuel. Rice,
bread, stuff like that.?

In the past 12 months there has been a sharp reversal of the 30-year trend
of steadily declining global food prices. It has been called the ?silent
tsunami? and experts agree on three things. First, price increases were
driven by a complex mix of factors including rising oil prices, the switch
to biofuels, increased demand in China, poor harvests in Australia and
commodity market speculation. Secondly, the steep and sudden increases are
temporary, because farmers will increase output in response. Thirdly, in the
long term the era of cheap food is over. Irrespective of short-term ups and
downs, prices will rise in the future.

This last ineluctable conclusion is a consequence of supply and demand. The
?green revolution? in agriculture has, since the 1960s, produced a
staggering increase in output through plant-breeding, use of fertiliser and
pesticides, and irrigation, albeit at huge environmental cost. But this
revolution has reached a plateau, while the number of mouths to feed
continues to grow, and people demand more food: not just the nearly one
billion not getting enough to eat, but those in transition economies
shifting from subsistence, plant-based diets to the more profligate food
habits that we enjoy in the UK.

This is why the scientist Gordon Conway has argued that the world needs a
?doubly green revolution? - in which agricultural output increases without
further damage to the environment. Projections from climate-change models
also suggest that it will become much harder to grow crops in some currently
productive parts of the world.

Should our response to these challenges include genetically modified (GM)
crops? Most agricultural scientists say yes. So far the European consumer
has said no. For the scientist, GM is an extension of the past 10,000 years
of genetic modification by agricultural selection. It is precision
engineering as opposed to the blunderbuss of conventional breeding, and has
the potential to transform agriculture in regions left out of the green
revolution, such as sub-Saharan Africa, by creating crops that are more
nutritious, resistant to disease or drought, and can grow without chemical
fertilisers. In other words GM could help to produce more and better food
with less environmental damage.

But as Robert Paarlberg so eloquently explains in his book Starved for
Science, the tragedy is that Africa has, in large degree, been discouraged
from adopting GM through the combined impact of European regulation,
lobbying by NGOs and the media in Europe. During a severe drought in 2002
President Mwanawasa of Zambia rejected US food aid in the form of GM maize
saying: ?Simply because my people are hungry, that is no justification to
give them food that is intrinsically dangerous to their health.? There is no
evidence that the GM maize was dangerous. Any Times reader who has been to
the US has probably eaten plenty of the same maize, but it is easy to see
why Zambia was suspicious, given that Europeans are so pernickety about it.

Is it time for a change of heart in Europe? The first GM food sold in
Britain, in the late 1990s, was Sainsbury's GM tomato paste, clearly
labelled as such. It was cheaper and outsold the non-GM equivalent. Then
various NGOs, combined with the media, turned against GM with the brilliant
invention of the term ?Frankenfoods?, and all supermarkets quickly declared
a GM-free policy for fear of losing customers. Properly constructed opinion
surveys show that the consuming public is by no means uniformly hostile to
GM, but pressure groups have driven it out of the market in Europe, and the
European Commission has supported this, introducing bizarre and
unenforceable regulations on labelling.

Almost all first-generation GM foods (the tomato paste was an exception)
benefited producers rather than consumers. Crops were engineered to resist
pests or herbicide. The argument goes: ?This is a new technology, perhaps
there is a risk, so if there is no benefit to me why should I accept it? -
and it has some force.

Wherever they are developed in the world, GM crops should be assessed for
risk before they are used on a large scale. There are two possible risks -
to the environment and to human health. The environmental safety of GM crops
is, and should be, a concern, demanding a precautionary approach, with
proper risk assessments before a crop is grown commercially.

All GM foods in Europe and North America are carefully assessed for health
risks before they are allowed on the market - which is more than can be said
for conventionally bred foods. Take, for instance, the familiar Braeburn
apple that appeared, by chance and of uncertain parentage, about 50 years
ago. No one knows how much genetic modification was involved and, as with
all other new varieties of foods produced by conventional breeding, it has
never been assessed for safety.

But we are now seeing a second generation of GM foods that could bring
direct benefits to European consumers. For us, price and security are less
critical than for sub-Saharan Africans, but GM tomatoes with enhanced
anti-cancer properties or GM soya with fish oils that are good for your
heart, might change people's view. Parents who have resolutely rejected GM
food might think again if there were direct benefits for their children: no
one objects to GM medicines such as human insulin produced by bacteria.

Once when I was explaining this point to Dan Glickman, then the US
Agriculture Secretary, he said: ?I see what you mean, John. We need the
tomato with the Viagra gene.?

Returning to the Oxfam advert, what should we do for the poorest countries?
One answer is to support agricultural research and development. Bilateral
aid from the world's leading economies for agricultural development has been
slashed in the past 20 years. If GM is to contribute to the doubly green
revolution and empower local people, we should not leave it to the biotech
industry alone. The necessary research should be done in these countries by
their own scientists, for their own people, with our support.

Lord Krebs is Principal of Jesus College, Oxford, and a former chairman of
the Food Standards Agency
www.checkbiotech.org