Better to deepen the scope of globalization for a larger portion of the world's population than try to make the farming population more productive. The argument, that science may one day manage to do irreparable harm to the planet with all its good intentions, has to be considered soberly. The web of life is intricate and delicate, but all these genetically-altered things may, hopefully, reform the earth into something more humanly comprehensible, but, more ominously, create a world we cannot tolerate. We may experiment our way to our own lab test for species extinction. Or, sheer hell from a taxpayer's perspective, create lab rats and grass, that ultimately fail.
Utility is still the criterion for funding.
Ultimately, biotechnological conundrums are economic and political. Getting the eggheads to create miracle rice is passing the buck. After all India touted its progress after the green revolution, but what has it been able to do lately. The same problems of a maldistribution of wealth will only recur at ever higher levels of technological prowess. And then Walton has to go back to sea, and Victor dreams of another way to cheat death.