The Enigmatic Science of Biotechnology

One of the major challenges that we face in the 21^st century is to achieve sustainable growth and development, when we are already faced with a rapidly declining resource base in terms of food, land and water, as a result of population explosion. There are no quick fix solutions to alleviate the sit-uation, but there are many promising new avenues which biotechnology as a science can offer to re-duce the pressure on the limited resources that we have. Biotechnology plays a pivotal role in every major sector of the economy i.e., agriculture, healthcare and industry. However, the full potential of biotechnology can be understood and harnessed only when the ensuing risks and benefits are ana-lyzed and weighed against each other, which would allow us to take an informed and judicious decision, thereafter.