Genetically Modified Crops Are on the Decline for the First Time

With the earth's population expected to hit more than nine billion by 2050, government agencies and thought leaders like Bill and Melinda Gates have pointed to genetically modified crops as a way to feed a growing planet.

But on the short term, we've hit a bit of a wall. For the first time ever, the overall area planted with GM crops declined globally this year.

The decline wasn't large—just 1 percent—but it breaks a growth trend that's lasted for 20 years. And the planting area isn't declining due to increased efficiency, though that is something that is a goal of GM crops. Low commodity prices are to blame, and demand for both GM and non-GM crops fell this year, according to the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications, a nonprofit that aims to improve the lives of small-scale farmers in developing countries through crop biotechnology.

Nature reports that moving forward, though, we're likely to see this one-year reversal turn around. The ISAAA estimates that there could be as many as 100 million additional hectares of GM crops planted in the future, with 60 million of them being planted in Asia. And currently, more than 85 kinds of new GM crops are in testing. Some of them are being modified with the gene-editing technique known as CRISPR, like this mushroom that won't ever turn brown. The mushroom, which the FDA said last week wasn't subject to its regulation, could be the first CRISPR-edited food product on the market.

It is unlikely, however, that much more acreage will be devoted to GM crops here in the United States and other major markets for GM products, as they are approaching saturation. The US is currently the biggest grower of GM crops, but, for the fourth year in a row, developing countries planted more new GM crops than industrialized countries.

The decline in hectares planted is probably welcome news to some, but the ISAA points to the economic benefits of biotechnology in farming. The group estimates that 28 countries have seen more than $150 billion in benefits from GM crops since 1996. In that time, we've gone from 1.7 million hectares to 179.7 million hectares of GM crops.

GM crops, some of which are engineered to be drought resistant, could prove increasingly valuable as global weather patterns shift due to climate change. When the rain stops falling, the GM controversy could become a little less controversial.