Growing pains of India's GM revolution (BBC)

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By Richard Black
Environment correspondent, BBC News website, India

"Indian farmers are clamouring for genetically-modified seeds"; so said India's agriculture minister Agit Singh five years ago.

If that indeed was the case then - which is open to dispute - much has changed since.

Genetically-modified varieties of crops such as rice, wheat, and mustard developed at home and abroad have not gone through commercial trials as their developers anticipated.

The only GM crop now being grown commercially might put a shirt on your back but is absolutely guaranteed not to alleviate hunger - it is cotton.

For the moment, India's biotech dream lies wilting on the wastelands of a farmer's degraded backyard.
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more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6338377.stm