Is Genetic Engineering the Answer to Hunger?
B oth the developed and developing worlds are facing a critical moral choice in the controversial issue of genetically modified food, also known as genetically modified organisms and genetically engineered crops. Critics of these modifications speak dismissively of biotech foods and genetic pollution. On the other hand, proponents like Nina Federoff and Nancy Marie Brown, authors of Mendel in the Kitchen: A Scientist’s View of Genetically Modified Foods (2004), promote genetically modified organisms (G.M.’s or G.M.O.’s) as “the miracle of seed science and fertilizers.” To mark the 20th anniversary of U.S. diplomatic relations with the Holy See, the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See, in cooperation with the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, hosted a conference last fall at Rome’s Gregorian University on “Feeding a Hungry World: The Moral Imperative of Biotechnology.” Archbishop Renato Martino, who heads the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and has been a strong and outspoken proponent
