Final Essay

Moreover, daily human action negatively impacts the earth; making it more and more polluted by the minute. Carbon emissions and similar negative gases contribute to climate change which can have severe consequences on, not only the environment but humans as well. Any possible reduction of these gases would largely benefit the environment and humans’ future well-being. GM crops are an efficient and effective solution to reducing such fumes as they reduce the amount of pesticides used on crops and have the ability to reduce soil erosion by promoting no-tilling farming. Farmers spray 970 million tons of pesticides in the U.S. alone. Research done on pesticides has concluded that these chemicals only negatively impact the environment and humans

However, this method removes nutrients from the soil which cause erosion and kills off many small organisms (Debunking Denialism, 2017). In today’s farming industry, soil erosion is a global problem where 25 billion tons of topsoil is lost due to runoff and wind. GM crops have been genetically engineered so they are herbicide-resistant. Therefore, they do not need as much mechanical weed removal, so tilling can be reduced. In summary, GM crops would allow the issue of soil erosion to be a problem of the past; benefiting our environment. On a final note, carbon emissions have been a worldwide issue for numerous years. The agriculture industry can greatly reduce carbon emissions through the use of genetically modified crops. A multitude of mechanical systems are needed to manage crops. Tasks like spraying pesticides and tilling soil consume drastic amounts of fuel every time a field must be managed. To elaborate, in 2013, the U.S. needed 54.5 litres of fuel to till one hectare of corn crop using conventional tilling methods. In comparison, using GM crops and no tilling, only 30.09 liters were

There are about 7.6 billion people in the world, and 815 million suffer from malnourishment (Hunger Notes, 2016). The number of people in the world is continually increasing and so is the number of people living in starvation. GMOs have the ability to provide these individuals with the proper nourishment they need to maintain safe and healthy lives. GMOs do not only benefit those living in third-world countries as even though most of us are fortunate enough to access various foods, not everyone eats healthy enough to provide their bodies with the nutrients they need to function properly. In third-world countries, approximately 3.1 million children die each year and 161 million have a stunted growth due to malnutrition. In some areas, the availability of food is not necessarily the issue, but the food does not contain the essential nutrients that children need during their prime years. GMOs can significantly help these countries through biofortification. This is a process where the nutritional value of crops is increased through genetic modification. For example, when humans consume foods like carrots that contain high levels of beta-carotene, part of it is converted to vitamin A. Genetic modification is used to insert corn genes and a bacterial gene to alter a rice plant’s metabolism so it could produce beta-carotene. This food is called golden rice and provides high levels