Druga gimnazija Sarajevo

International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme

Biology

ESSAY

Food science application and technology

Word count:939

Research question: how biotechnology improves production and food

quality

Student: Teacher:
Liam Eric O’Reilly Elvira Kukuljac
 23 September 2023
Table of contents

1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………1

2. Why do the farmers like it?..................................................................2

3. The doubts………………………………………………………………….4

4. Conclusion………………………………………………………………….5

5. Bibliography………………………………………………………………..6
INTRODUCTION

Today I will be talking about how biotechnology improves production and

food quality. I will be looking at the pros and cons of biotechnology in the

process of food production. But first I will answer the question: what is

Biotechnology? It is the use of biology to develop new products, methods

and organisms intended to improve human health and society. It has

existed since the beginning of civilization with the domestication of plants,

animals and the discovery of fermentation. Biotechnology is not a new

science or a new invention, but in the last century biotechnology has gotten

very important for the food and agriculture industry. In the last few years

biotechnology has become a controversial topic with some people

questioning how healthy and safe it is in certain situations. Although if you

were to ask a farmer what he/she thinks of it they would say it is great! That

is because it saves them so much money since it provides farmers with

tools that can make production cheaper and more manageable. For

example, some biotechnology crops can be engineered to tolerate specific

herbicides, which make weed control simpler and more efficient.

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Why do the farmers like it?

Biotechnology is a never ending science, every day new plants and seeds

are being put under a microscope and thoroughly observed to see if they

can be modified to help people. For example it has been used to protect

crops from devastating diseases. The papaya ringspot virus threatened to

derail the Hawaiian papaya industry until papayas resistant to the disease

were developed through genetic engineering. This saved the U.S. papaya

industry. Crops with the ability to grow in salty soils or better withstand

drought conditions are also in the works and the first such products are just

entering the marketplace. Such innovations may be increasingly important

in adapting to or in some cases helping to mitigate the effects of climate

change. Biotech can also improve the nutritional value of certain crops, this

can be very beneficial for people living in rural areas as you can buy less

food but still get all the vitamins and essential nutrients such as iron and

vitamin A [1,2,3,4] and also Similar technologies have been used to fend off

chronic illnesses including heart disease and cancer [5,6]. When compared

to the traditional extraction of flavor molecules from plants, biotechnology

can provide a valuable advantage: consistency.

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Three countries in Africa: Egypt, South Africa and Burkina Faso have been

already profited through biotechnological adaptation of numerous methods

of cultivation.

For instance, 0.1 million Burkina Faso’s farmers elevated the cotton yield

by 126% with the potential use of Genetic modification technology of food.

Scientists are using the method of biotechnology for the production of fruits

with enhanced taste. Genetically modified foods with enhanced taste are

eggplant, cherries, pepper, seedless watermelon and tomato etc. The seed

are removed from these fruits which shows better consequences such as

more content of sugar with soluble form increasing sweetness in fruits

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The doubts

Biotechnology sounds too good to be true and unfortunately there are

some doubts and safety concerns about it. One of the biggest doubts being

GMO or Genetically modified organisms National Geographic defines it as

“A genetically modified organism is an organism that contains DNA that has

been altered using genetic engineering. Genetically modified plants are

common in today’s food supply.” Different GM organisms include different

genes inserted in different ways. This means that individual GM foods and

their safety should be assessed on a case-by-case basis and that it is not

possible to make general statements on the safety of all GM foods. With

the use of biotechnology in agriculture you can make certain crops grow

faster or make them grow bigger which just sounds very weird and

unnatural to me. There also have been a few weird incidents with

biotechnology for instance, in 2001, Australian scientists hoping to

genetically engineer the mousepox virus to render lab mice infertile

accidentally created a lethal mousepox virus.

The Biotechnology safety topic is still not researched enough, so I would

recommend doing your own research when buying Genetically modified

food.

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Conclusion

My conclusion is that biotechnology definitely helps production and

agriculture, saving money and time and bringing different types of crops to

areas people thought they would never grow. But I think that biotechnology

helping the quality of food and crops is still a very shady thing, there is not

enough research to prove that it is 100% safe.

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Bibliography

WWW pages

EUFIC. “Modern Biotechnology in Food: What Is Food Biotechnology?”

Modern Biotechnology in Food: What Is Food Biotechnology?, 6 Aug. 2006,
www.eufic.org/en/food-production/article/modern-biotechnology-in-food-
what-is-food-biotechnology

National Geographic Society. “Genetically Modified Organisms.” Education,

20May2022, education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/genetically-
modified-organisms/

USDA.“Biotechnology FAQs.” Biotechnology,

www.usda.gov/topics/biotechnology/biotechnology-frequently-asked-
questions-faqs
Accessed 25 Sept. 2023.

Word Health Organization. “Food, Genetically Modified.” World Health

Organization, World Health Organization, 1 May 2014, www.who.int/news-
room/questions-and-answers/item/food-genetically-modified.

Barney, Nick, and Sarah Lewis. “What Is Biotechnology? Definition, Types

and Applications: TechTarget.” WhatIs.Com, TechTarget, 1 Nov. 2022,

www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/biotechnology.
Hefferon, Kathleen L. “Nutritionally Enhanced Food Crops; Progress and

Perspectives.” International Journal of Molecular Sciences, U.S. National

Library of Medicine, 11 Feb. 2015,

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4346933/

Hefferon, Kathleen L. “Nutritionally Enhanced Food Crops; Progress and

Perspectives.” International Journal of Molecular Sciences, U.S. National

Library of Medicine, 11 Feb. 2015,

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4346933/

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