EU Opposition to Genitically Modified Wheat - Its Impact on Global Food Security

Crop Biotechnology has the potential to achieve a more food-secure world. However the strong opposition to GM food particularly in Europe will undoubtedly affect the diffusion of GM crops worldwide delaying or preventing the world from realizing the potential benefits of GM crops in terms of food security. This braking effect could deprive the world of a potential tool to increase or stabilize the future global availability of food under a changing or more volatile climate. It is therefore essential to understand how the opposition to GM food has and will affect the diffusion of biotechnological innovations worldwide in order to estimate the effect of this opposition on global food security. The main objective of this book is to estimate the loss in global food security if the EU does not relax their opposition to GM wheat. To meet this objective a market model is combined with a GM diffusion model to create a global food security (GFS) model. A number of scenarios are analyzed to consider the range of potential effects of the EU opposition to GM wheat on global food security. The results of the analyses will better inform the ongoing GM policy debates which often ignore food security impacts.