TWC Lesson 7

Brief Overview/Summary

The lesson this week was also about BioBusiness revolution, except instead we touched more about Agribiology, environmental life sciences and industrial biotechnology. First off we started with a quote from Norman Borlaug, about how an adequate food supply was indispensible to the growth of civilization. We then talked about the various colours associated with the BioBusiness industry, red signifying biomedical sciences, green for agriculture, blue for marine biotech and lastly white for industrial biotech.

For agribiology, we discussed about how the farmist has a greater set of skills compared to the farmer, we debated on whether should we continue on with genetic modification(GM). Food security was also touched on, having adequate food supply to meet our needs, given that Singapore is totally dependent on it's neighbours, could agribiology possibly be a feasible solution? We also talked about the reason why most of the food we eat are not labelled with GM, due to the US being a economic giant forcing other countries to adopt the same policies even though some are not following suit.

Next up, we touched on environmental sciences, we learnt about the potential and possibilities that waste management has, how it will become one of the biggest markets in the future. This was followed by bioremediation, which is any process that uses microorganisms, fungi, green plants or their enzymes to return the natural environment altered by contaminants to its original condition. Industrial life sciences were next, we talked about related technologies such as flash pyrolysis, taking human/plant remains and compressing them under pressure to create biofuels, whereby the cost for a barrel of biofuel is around $60-65.

Interesting Observations and Ideas

Reading 5 stated that the world's population is expected to reach 9.1 billion by 2050, but the main concern is whether there would be enough land, food and water for everyone. Technology and innovation has always managed to stay ahead in the game of feeding the world, but we should not take it for granted and additional steps have to be taken to ensure that this continues. Policies and institutions have to be created so that there is sustainable global food security. If there isn't enough food supply for everyone, then it is likely that the food supply would be dominated by developed countries, leaving the rest to suffer and we cannot allow this to occur.

I felt that the presentation by Anneliese about 'The tower garden' was very applicable to creating a sustainable food supply for everyone. Some of my peers in class pointed out several issues with it's feasibility, such as the culture in Singapore will not generate much success for this idea. However, given that Singapore is beginning to have an ageing population and there will be more people who are retired, why not encourage them to start their own tower gardens? Every 7-8 weeks when the vegetables are grown, a person working in public service can come to collect them. At the end of every year, they could possibly get monetary rewards from the government. It may seem like a small and insignificant effort, but if we can be pioneers of this idea and possibly influence others to follow suit, it can create a ripple effect that may prove to be beneficial to humanity as a whole.

One of the phrases mentioned by Prof Shahi, "It is not inconceivable that we may one day develop efficient home bioreactors for converting household biological wastes into energy for powering our household appliances" was one that I found very interesting. This was a perfect example of a circular model, utlising what we no longer need to create energy that we need. No longer will we have to dump our wastes into the environment leading to environmental degradation. This can be coupled with other alternative energy sources such as solar power, if there is a concern that the power generated may not be sufficient, solar power could power the house in the day, while biofuels could do so at night.

One of the videos showed that humans were no more than parasites, we only destroy rather than create. It was not so obvious in the past before the industrial revolution, but it is becoming more apparent now. There may come a time when we can reduce the amount of resources we consume and wastes that we dump onto the environment, but for now I will have to agree with the video.

Key Takeaways

If you do not experiment, test or validate, we will never grow and learn. Monsato is a very fine example of this phrase, they were responsible for the production of RBGH, which increased the production of milk in cows, but side effects included infection which created pus in milk. However, they are also responsible for the many innovations leading to increase in agricultural production in USA. Innovations like these are exactly what we need to generate global food security, even if they may go wayward at times.

The world has seen a rise in urban population from 29 percent to 61 percent, mainly brought about by Latin America, Asia, Africa. There are too many people in the rural environments, more people need to move to urban environments. Before this lesson I always though it was the urban environments that were too overcrowded and rural people should continue staying at rural environments. However, I was proven wrong as the people at rural environments have even lesser space compared to those in urban environments and this in turn is affecting the agricultural productivity. The reason why urban environments are seen as overcrowded instead is because there urban environments can only grow so fast to cater to the urban population.

The whole world would probably be more efficient if everyone was vegetarian, 70 percent is used as feed but only 25 percent of meat is provided. Many people, in particular meat lovers, would probably disagree with this approach and I am no exception. However, what if we could put animal cells into crops, such that the crops would taste like meat?

Issues for Discussion

In the late 70s, there was an oil shortage due to OPEC, and oil prices rised significantly, hence people started looking at alternatives and the electric car came to my mind instantly.However, when oil prices dropped the impetus faded. Were there any similar occurences happening after this incident? How about last year when the oil prices skyrocketed again? I felt that this issue was not addressed in the lesson.

Ratings

I would rate this lesson an 8 as there were many things I learnt from the lesson itself, the readings and the presentations, one of which is that GM promotes monoculture farming and the same crops would drain on the same nutrients.