Over 800 million people depend on cassava as a main intellectual nourishment raw material . Also hump as manioc and yuca , this root veggie also makes up around 50 percent of the caloric intake of around one - third of people in sub - Saharan Africa .
regrettably , it is n’t the most nourishing of food source . As a result , smoothing iron and atomic number 30 lack are sky high in many part of Africa . It ’s estimated that up to 75 percent of preschool children and 67 percent of fraught women in Nigeria are anemic as a result of iron want .
However , researchers have now developed super - charged cassava using genetic engineering science to enrich the plant with significantly gamey stage of both iron and zinc .
Reporting in the journalNature , scientist at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in the US make the genetically change being ( GMO ) using two gene take from thale cress ( Arabidopsis thaliana ) that encode for an atomic number 26 conveyance protein and an Fe memory board protein . By inserting these two genes into the cassava ’s genome , the works was " biofortified " with increased Fe and zinc . By the researchers ' estimates , the gene - pick off cassava could offer shaver aged 1 to 6 years with up to 50 percent of the dietary essential for iron and up to 70 per centum for Zn .
GMOs often get a very bad knock as beingtoxic “ Frankenfoods,”however , the absolute majority of these concerns are entirely unfounded . Literally , thousandsof scientific studies have found that GMOs present no risk to human health , animate being , or the environment .
The European Union(EU ) pored C of meg of one dollar bill into enquiry regarding the biosafety of GMOs . After a decade of body of work , using the help of 130 inquiry studies and over 500 main research mathematical group , they concluded that “ GMOs are not per se more risky than for instance ceremonious plant breeding technologies . ”
According to a statement by theAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science(AAAS ) in 2012 : " The World Health Organization , the American Medical Association , the US National Academy of Sciences , the British Royal Society , and every other respected organization that has examine the evidence has amount to the same conclusion : take foods containing ingredients infer from GM crop is no hazardous than consuming the same foods hold ingredient from crop plants modify by conventional plant improvement techniques . "
Pretty much all intellectual nourishment has been pick off genetically , albeit not quite as straight as modern genic engineering . Wheat , for example , started as simply a grass until ancient human beings fostered sure genes to produce big amounts of grain .
Even as it stands now , it is guess that some70 percentof process food in America contain GMO ingredients . As Earth ’s universe continues to heighten at an unprecedented pace , and climate change is place to work havoc with the planet , it has been argued that genetically modified crops could the only way to feed everyone on the planet .
