President Obama says agricultural biotechnology is an important element in feeding the world and adapting to climate change. In a letter to the granddaughter of Nobel laureate Norman Borlaug, the president said, “I share his belief that investment in enhance biotechnology is an essential component of the solution to some of our planet’s most pressing agricultural problems.” Agri-Pulse says the letter is Obama’s “clearest endorsement to date of the important role biotechnology plays in agriculture.”
The administration has supported ag biotech in ways such as urging other nations to accept GMO crops. While running for his first term, Obama “explicitly endorsed genetically engineered crops in an answer to a candidate questionnaire,” said the Des Moines Register in November 2008, listing four other signs of Obama’s backing for the technology.