Advancements of

Biotechnology in
the Field of
Agriculture
What is Agricultral
Biotechnology?
Agricultural biotech­nology is the area of
biotechnology involving applica­tions to agriculture. It
has been practiced for a long time, as people have
sought to im­prove agriculturally important organisms
by selection and breeding.
Examples of
Agricultural
biotechnology
Vaccines
Oral vaccines have been in the works for many years as
a possible solution to the spread of disease in
underdeveloped countries, where costs are prohibitive
to widespread vaccination.
Antibiotics
Plants are used to produce antibiotics for both human
and animal use. Expressing antibiotic proteins in
livestock feed, fed directly to animals, is less costly
than traditional antibiotic production, but this raises
many bioethics issues because the result is
widespread.
Biofuel
Genetic engineering and enzyme optimization
 techniques are being used to develop better quality
feedstocks for more efficient conversion and higher
BTU outputs of the resulting fuel products.