Feature Article

THE recent accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan has left governments across the world worried over the safety of nuclear energy and its waste. As radioactive materials contaminated water, soil and air, technology to clean up the waste came to the forefront.

SOUMYA Swaminathan’s 16-year-old son, Sudarshan, loves sports, and is training to be a footballer. Two years ago, he was confused which sport to train in. “He would come home and say he wants to play cricket. Next week it would be football,” says Swaminathan. Then she heard about the sports DNA test offered by Super Religare Laboratories (SRL). The Mumbai-based firm had just launched the test, which would examine DNA from your saliva sample for variants of a gene linked with sporting prowess. It turned out that Sudarshan had a genetic predilection for power sports.

Are hybrids always a precursor to a genetically modified (GM) version of the crop? In the case of maize, both the champions of GM and the opposition believe GM maize is round the corner.

When representatives of the world’s largest seed company, Monsanto, began to make discreet visits to the second floor offices of the inconspicuous Van Bandhu Kalyaan Yojana in the Gandhinagar headquarters of the Gujarat government in 2007, it set in motion a process that would transform Indian agriculture in unexpected and significant ways. Maize farming in the most backward recesses of the country would change forever, with tribal populations giving up their traditional seeds for the world’s best-known Dekalb brand of hybrid maize (corn) and age-old methods of pesticide-free cultivation giving way to the industrial model of farming.

The courtyard of Retnamma’s house resembles a battlefield. There are dead giant snails strewn around, slime oozing from their brown conch-shaped shells. “These are the ones I killed last night with salt,” says the 60-year-old resident of Konni village in the foothills of the Western Ghats in Kerala.