Transgenic Crops: Implications for Biodiversity and Sustainable Agriculture

The potential for genetically modified (GM) crops to threaten biodiversity conservation and sustainable agriculture is substantial. Megadiverse countries and centers of origin and/or diversity of crop species are particularly vulnerable regions. The future of sustain-able agriculture may be irreversibly jeopardized by contamination of in situ preserved genetic resources threatening a strategic resource for the world’s food security. Because GM crops are truly biological novel-ties, their release into the environment poses concerns about the unpredictable ecological and evolutionary responses that GM species themselves and the inter-acting biota may express in the medium and long term. One of the consequences of these processes may be a generalized contamination of natural flora by GM traits and a degradation and erosion of the commonly owned genetic resources available today for agricul-tural development. GM plants carrying pharmaceuti-cal and industrial traits will pose even more danger-ous risks if released in the environment