When asking the questions about GMOs and what people truly think, it is very diverse. The world is making insane technological changes day by day and GMOs are starting to become bigger and bigger in everyday life. Genetically modified organisms not only benefit mankind by increasing the availability and quality of food and medical care, and contributing to a cleaner environment, it improves life for a farmer because they require less water and fewer chemical applications than conventional crops, and they are better able to survive drought, weeds, and insects. During present times, most major crops are decreasing and the demand for food for both grain and animal protein is increasing quickly. To keep up with the challenge, farms are required to produce and improve steady yields with the major crops needed. Conventional farming is beginning to be put to bed due to the fact that it does not generate a steady supply of improved crops. To meet the target and keep up in communities, GM crops are required to fix all of the imperfections and problems with farming nowadays.

GM crops are plants that have been modified, using genetic engineering, to alter their DNA to provide traits within the crop that benefits them from issues that damage them. When genetically modifying  a crop it can boost the crop yield which it has, developing a greater production in that specific crop. For farmers this is great because before genetically modified crops came about, farmers were losing many crops and fields due to diseases or environmental issues. As Theresa Phillips in her article, “Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs): Transgenic Crops and Recombinant DNA Technology,” explains, “Scientists can also engineer pest-resistant crops, helping local farmers better withstand environmental challenges that might otherwise wipe out a whole season of produce.” 

In the National Geographic Society article, “Are Genetically Modified Crops the Answer to World Hunger?” The National Geographic claims, “Crops can even be engineered to be more nutritious, providing critical vitamins to populations that struggle to get specific nutrients needed for healthy living.” Crops are merged with multivitamins to enhance the product’s nutritional value. These crops are also merged with traits such as insecticidal trails to make them harder, which increases their annual yields. Having traits that increase annual yields are especially important to regions that are food starved.

Across the US in the world of agriculture, diseases are a big factor and a pain for farmers today. A major disease going farm to farm is downy mildew. “Cucumber downy mildew (CDM) is a destructive plant disease caused by the air-borne oomycete pathogen Pseudoperonospora cubensis. CDM causes severe yield reduction of cucumber and significant economic losses.”, defined by Zhanbin Sun in the article, “Biological Control of the Cucumber Downy Mildew”. A study was shown that a field was planted with regular cucumbers and genetically modified squash. Within the study the regular cucumbers were toasted and covered in downy mildew. One bed over the genetically modified squash was untouched by downy mildew and those squash plants grew and all of those plants were healthy.

Especially in today’s day in age there are many insects that come from different countries that hurt plants and can ruin a whole field of crops. Along with ruining the crops these insects get stuck on the crop which causes companies to produce more labor in removing these insects which is time consuming and very costly. A widely accepted benefit of using genetically modified crops is for insect control. Gm crops have the ability to reduce the use of less effective and less environmentally friendly insects. These abilities stand out towards pests, and insect pest management strategy for farmers.

GM crops have been expressing insecticidal substances in their tissues and have been grown for over a decade, which has shown  higher crop yields, a decrease in insecticide use, and an increase in farm profitability. These crops improve farmers, the environment, and society all in one. Recently there has been a major decrease in the earth’s soil on farms all over. Even with the composting, cycling crops method and resting fields it still isn’t enough for the soil to catch up to itself. Gm crops that are made tolerant to herbicides help greatly with farms in controlling weeds without damaging crops or the groups that the crops are planted on. When these herbicide crops are used by farmers, that means that farms do not have to till the soil. Farmers till the soil to get rid of weeds, but tilling the ground each time damages the health of the soil tremendously. With the GM crop that reduces weeds help to maintain soil health and also lowers fuel cost with less use of tractors and lower labor cost and use. 

Water is a necessity for any type of agriculture or anything in live. In many places, water usage is a struggle. Parts of the world get little to no rain so the water usage on farms is extremely costly and labor intensive. Some farmers simply do not have the money to support watering the crops. Genetically modified crops can allow farmers to use less water. The technique of modifying crops to use less water reduces the impact on droughts and helps support cleaner water ways, but also produce more crops. 

References

Kavhiza, Nyasha John, et al. “Improving Crop Productivity and Ensuring Food Security 

 through the Adoption of Genetically Modified Crops in Sub-Saharan Africa.”  

MDPI, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, 10 Feb. 2022,  

https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4395/12/2/439.

Nature News, Nature Publishing Group 

,  https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/genetically-modified -organisms 

 -gmos-transgenic-crops-and-732/. 

“Are Genetically Modified Crops the Answer to World Hunger?” National Geographic 

 Society, https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/ are-genetically- ‘

 modified-crops-answer-world-hunger. 

Sun, Zhanbin, et al. “Biological Control of the Cucumber Downy Mildew Pathogen 

 Pseudoperonospora Cubensis.” MDPI, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing 

 Institute, 6 May 2022, https://www.mdpi.com/2311-7524/8/5/410. 

Oliver, Melvin J. “Why We Need GMO Crops in Agriculture.” Missouri Medicine, 

 Journal of the Missouri State Medical Association, 2014, 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6173531/.