ARGUMENT

An international development organization, in response to a vitamin A deficiency among people in the impoverished nation of Tagus, has engineered a new breed of millet high in vitamin A. While seeds for this new type of millet cost more, farmers will be paid subsidies for farming the new variety of millet. Since millet is already a staple food in Tagus, people will readily adopt the new variety. To combat vitamin A deficiency, the government of Tagus should do everything it can to promote this new type of millet.

Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.

ESSAY

The author's argument that "the government of Tagus should do everything it can to promote this new type of millet" depends on the veracity of certain parameters. A number of assumptions need to be validated in order to justify the predicted result. In order to validate these assumptions, a number of questions also must be answered in order to bolster his/her hypothesis.

The first assumption proclaims that an organization has successfully engineered a new breed of millet high in vitamin A. Since this strain of millet has been engineered, what negative impacts can it have on the human body? The jury is still out on the potentially deleterious health implications of human engineered food.
Additionally, how successfully can the human body absorb vitamin A from millet? If absorption rates are low, then the primary benefit of this grain is no longer serviceable to the populace of Tagus.

Furthermore, another expository sentence in the author's statement assumes that farmers will be willing to plant and harvest this grain. This belief stems from the subsidies that will be provided on this millet. In reality, do subsidies actually offset the increased costs for this engineered grain? If the costs of the seeds exceed the aforementioned subsidies, then it does not make financial sense for Tagus farmers to grow this crop.

The third (and perhaps most important) assumption asserts that people will readily adopt the new variety of millet since it is a staple food. This statement assumes that the engineered millet will have similar taste, texture, cooking properties, and cost when compared to current market millet. For instance if the taste of this grain is underwhelming or the cost of it is too high, Tagus citizens may shun this new variety in favor of more flavorful or cheaper forms of millet.

The author's argument depends on the accuracy of a few parameters to achieve the predicted result. Questions around the health implications of this engineered millet, the costs of planting it, and its adoption rates must be answered in order to prove or disprove the author's recommendation. Whether or not the government should passionately promote this product depends on the answers to the above inquiries.