Biofortification of Rice to Combat Micronutrient Malnutrition
Basanti Brar1, Sumnil Marwaha2, Prasad Minakshi3*
1HABITAT, GIPPCL, Biofertilizer Production and Technology Centre, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, Haryana, India; 2ICAR- National Research Centre on Camel, Bikaner; 3*Department of Animal Biotechnology, Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Hisar, India
Corresponding authors email: minakshi.abt@gmail.com
Introduction
More than half of the world’s population, especially women and children in the developing countries, suffer from micronutrient malnutrition or ‘hidden hunger’ resulting from the consumption of meager bioavailable vitamins and minerals containing diets. Micronutrient malnutrition is the condition that develops when the body does not get the optimum amount of the vitamins, minerals and other micronutrients which are essential to maintain metabolic regulation and organ function. Among the major nutritional problems common in developing countries are: micronutrient (iron, zinc, vitamin A) and protein-energy malnutrition. It is estimated that over 800 million people go to bed hungry everyday and approximately 3 billion people are suffering from micronutrient deficiency. Micronutrient malnutrition causes several diseases (anemia, child blindness, endemic goiter, etc.); the affected people are more prone to infection to other diseases resulting in further deterioration in quality of life.
Rice (Oryza sativa L.), the world’s most important food crop that feeds over half of the global population, is a model plant species for genomic research. Over the past few decades till 1990, most of the breeding research was concentrated on increasing the grain yield and to improve the resistance to environmental stresses, pests and pathogens, but little or no attention was given towards the enhancement of its nutritional quality. In 1966, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) released the first high yielding rice variety ‘IR8’. In the subsequent decade, a small number of such high yielding varieties almost completely replaced the thousands of the traditional rice landraces previously cultivated by the farmers. This resulted in the immense ‘genetic erosion’ and loss of biodiversity. Despite the loss, a lot of germplasm still exists and being maintained by the international such as International Rice Research Institute (IRRI, The Philippines) and national research institutions in various countries. Most of this germplasm is yet to be tested for the nutritional quality traits. Several groups have examined the feasibility of “Biofortification” approach for improving the micronutrient content of staple crops and found that: (i) substantial useful genetic variation exists in key staple crops (ii) breeding programs can readily manage nutritional quality traits, which have been reported to be highly heritable in some crops and desired traits are sufficiently stable across a wide range of growing environments and (iii) traits for high nutrient content can be combined with superior agronomic and high yield characteristics.
Micronutrient malnutrition the hidden-hunger
Micronutrient malnutrition is the condition that develops when the body does not get the optimum amount of the vitamins, minerals and other micronutrients which are essential to maintain metabolic regulation and organ function. Among the major nutritional problems common in developing countries are: micronutrient (iron, zinc, vitamin A) and protein-energy malnutrition. It is estimated that over 800 million people go to bed hungry everyday and approximately 3 billion people are suffering from micronutrient deficiency. More than half of the world’s population, especially women and children in the developing countries, suffer from micronutrient malnutrition or ‘hidden hunger’ resulting from the consumption of meager bioavailable vitamins and minerals containing diets. Micronutrient malnutrition causes several diseases (anemia, child blindness, endemic goiter, etc.); the affected people are more prone to infection to other diseases resulting in further deterioration in quality of life. The major problem is that, to date approximately 840 million people suffer from all malnutrition and every day 24,000 die from malnutrition. The situation has become even more alarming as 250-500 thousand children go blind each year from vitamin A deficiency.
Iron deficiency is the most common micronutrient deficiency in the world. Globally, anemia affects more than 1.6 billion people, or approximately 25% of the population. In developing countries, approximately 50% of anemia in the population is thought to be due to iron-deficiency but the proportion may vary among population groups and in different areas according to local conditions. According to WHO estimates, iron deficiency is most rampant in preschool children and pregnant women in developing countries. Iron deficiency results in anemia in human beings that reduce the immune competence, impairs the body homeostasis, affect the development brain.
Billions of people are at risk for zinc deficienc. In fact, more than 400,000 children die each year due to zinc deficiency. Current estimates of the risk of zinc deficiency indicate that approximately one-third of the world’s population live in countries where the risk of zinc deficiency is high. Zinc is involved in more body functions than any other mineral. Zinc’s role include acting as necessary component of more than 200 enzyme systems, normal growth and development, the maintenance of body tissues, sexual function, and the immune system.
Some 127 million preschool children are vitamin A-deficient, which is about one-quarter of all preschool children in high-risk regions of the developing world. Globally, approximately 4.4 million preschool-age children have visible eye damage due to vitamin A deficiency. Close to 20 million pregnant women in developing countries are also vitamin A deficient, of which about one-third are clinically night-blind. Nearly one-half of these cases occur in India.
Animals, including humans, are incapable of synthesizing 10 of the 20 amino acids needed for protein synthesis, and these ‘‘essential’’ amino acids must therefore be obtained from the diet. Amino acid deficiency causes the disease “kwashiorkor” and its symptoms include apathy, diarrhoea, inactivity, failure to grow, and edema.
Biofortification
Biofortification, a new approach that relies on conventional plant breeding and modern biotechnology to increase the micronutrient density of staple crops, holds great promise for improving the nutritional status and health of poor populations in both rural and urban areas of the developing world. Biofortification has the potential to provide coverage for remote rural populations, where supplementation and fortification programs may not reach, and it inherently targets the poor who consume high levels of staple foods and little else. Plant breeding to increase micronutrient density began to gain legitimacy when deficiencies in micronutrients such as Fe, Zn, and vitamins were recognized as an issue of overwhelming global public health significance and one of the major development challenges of the 21st century. A comprehensive program on “Biofortification” is the one of solution to combat micronutrient malnutrition.
Conclusion
“Biofortification” refers to the development of micronutrient-dense staple crops using the best traditional breeding practices and modern biotechnology. This approach has multiple advantages. First, it capitalizes on regular daily intake of a consistent and large amount of staple food by all family members, because staple foods are predominantly consumed by the poor people. Second, after the one-time investment to develop seeds that fortify themselves, recurrent costs are low, and germplasm can be shared internationally. Third, biofortification provides a feasible mean of reaching undernourished populations in relatively remote rural areas, delivering naturally fortified foods to people with limited access to commercially marketed fortified foods that are more readily available in urban areas/developed nations.
