The Problem With Genetic Engineering

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The Problem With Genetic Engineering

A new millennium is dawning, and with it a new age. For the first time, humans are able to manipulate the very fabric of life, shuffling the genetic deck that controls every aspect of every living organism in ways that nature never intended.

It began in 1971 with a microscopic bacterium that was genetically altered to devour oil spills. Today, less than three decades later, a powerful, profit-driven industry, comprised largely of the same companies that have made their fortunes in chemical pesticides, has sprung up around this new science. Genetically engineered crops cover an estimated one-quarter of all cropland in the United States: about half of all the soybeans and cotton grown, and a third of all corn.

This science of tinkering with nature in the hope of improving upon it is a heady business. By splicing genes and dicing DNA, scientists may someday cure dreaded diseases and create powerful vaccines. But what offers such promise in the tightly controlled laboratories of medicine raises deeply troubling implications in the open fields and yards of the worlds farms and gardens. With regard to genetically altered life-forms, once a mistake is made and released into the environment, there is no certainty it can ever be undone.

Here at Organic Gardening, we know such a highly unnatural technology would never have a place in our definition of organic gardening, but we have resisted a rush to judgment. Monsanto, DuPont, and other major corporate players in the emerging genetic engineering market have argued that their products hold the power to feed the world while cutting pesticide use and curbing erosion. Yet the more information we gather, studies we read, and scientific debates we monitor, the more convinced we become that those claims are overblown at best and that the science of biotechnology is lurching forward far too rapidly and with neither adequate study nor precaution. The lack of rigorous, independent study and government regulation heightens our concern.

A rising chorus of scientists, academics, and ethicists is voicing alarm at this exploding, and largely uncharted, technology. Jane Rissler, Ph.D., a former biotechnology regulator with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) who is now with the Union of Concerned Scientists, says, "Were skeptical of the benefits of this technology, and were concerned about the risks. We think there are better alternatives to solving challenges in agriculture, and the public should have a say in how the technology is used and developed."

The public's say is critical. Consumers have no way to know when they are eating genetically altered foods. That's because the Food and Drug Administration has chosen not to classify alien genes as food additives and therefore does not require that they be listed on food labels. A bag of corn chips, for instance, must disclose that salt has been added, but it need not reveal that the corn itself has been genetically manipulated to contain its own pesticide. At a minimum, shouldn't shoppers have a right to make informed decisions?

"Labeling is the first step, because it gives people the right to choose," says Richard Wolfson, Ph.D., the Canadian chairman of the Consumer Right to Know Campaign, an umbrella organization for numerous groups that are calling for mandatory labeling and long-term testing of all genetically engineered foods. "Without labeling, there's no way to trace any health effects, and there is no way to protect consumers."

Around the world, protests continue to mount against these genetically modified "Frankenfoods," as they have been dubbed. The European Union has banned virtually all genetically altered corn imports, effectively freezing out all U.S. corn until recently because modified varieties were not separated from the rest of the crop. The cost to American farmers was about $200 million in 1998. Japan is demanding labeling of genetically engineered foods. Americans have been far more willing to accept such foods without question, but that is now changing. Two lawsuits demanding labeling have been filed against the FDA, and last spring, Congress received half a million signatures on petitions calling for labeling of gene-altered foods. Several other campaigns are now under way.

In addition to not requiring labeling of these foods, the FDA does not demand testing of them. It requires only the manufacturers assurance that they are safe. Similarly, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the EPA have no comprehensive testing requirements. "There is no meaningful, scientifically credible process across all federal government agencies to evaluate the hazards of genetically engineered organisms," says Suzanne Wuerthele, Ph.D., an EPA risk- assessment expert. "The bottom line, in my personal view, is that we are confronted with the most powerful technology the world has ever known, and it is being rapidly deployed with almost no thought whatsoever to its consequences."

Here are 10 reasons why all of us should be troubled about the rapid proliferation of genetically engineered foods.

1. Superbugs: Of the 50 or so genetically engineered plants currently cleared by the government for use, most fall into two basic categories: plants engineered to include their own pesticide, a toxin produced by the BT (Bacillus thuringiensis) bacterium, and plants engineered to survive weed killers, including the so-called Roundup Ready soybeans and cotton.

BT is a natural and highly effective pesticide that has long been used by organic growers to control caterpillars and other pests. But what organic farmers and gardeners use sparingly, biotechnology has introduced into each cell of every genetically engineered plant, from the roots to the pollen to the chaff plowed under after harvest. Because of BT's ubiquitous presence in millions of acres of crops, even the industry's own scientists concede that it is just a matter of time?as little as 3 to 5 years?before BT- resistant insect strains evolve. Directives that farmers interplant these BT-carrying crops with nonmodified varieties is expected to merely delay the inevitable. And when the inevitable happens, organic growers will lose a powerful pest control, and conventional growers will return to chemical pesticides?unless, of course, biotechnology can come up with yet a new generation of pest-immune crops.

Besides, although there is no evidence that BT-carrying crops hurt humans, there is something unsettling about eating food that is itself a pesticide registered with the EPA. Unlike conventional pesticides, the built-in BT bug killer cannot be washed off; it is in every bite.

2. Superweeds: Scientists also warn that some herbicide-tolerant crops are cross-pollinating with wild cousins and could create herbicide-resistant weeds. Another threat, according to Dr. Rissler, is that some genetically engineered crops themselves, bred to resist insects and other natural controls, could become invasive, spreading beyond their fields and choking out natural habitats.

3. Pollen drift: Organic farmers could lose their certification and face huge financial losses if their fields are contaminated by wind-borne pollen from neighboring genetically modified crops. Even nonorganic farmers are at risk for problems. In Canada, Monsanto accused canola grower Percy Schmeiser of patent infringement after the company allegedly found genetically engineered Roundup Ready canola plants in Schmeisers fields. Schmeiser claims he never planted any Monsanto seeds. After mediation efforts failed last summer, he filed a $10 million lawsuit against Monsanto, claiming libel, trespass, and contamination of his fields.

4. Harm to wildlife: Cornell University researchers made headlines when they announced laboratory research showing that monarch butterfly larvae died after eating milkweed dusted with genetically engineered corn pollen containing the BT pesticide. Milkweed, the monarch's primary food source, commonly grows alongside corn. Researchers in Europe have made similar discoveries involving ladybugs and green lacewings, both beneficial insects. Yet another study, reported in 1997 in the British publication New Scientist, indicates that honeybees may be harmed by feeding on proteins found in genetically engineered canola flowers.

5. Harm to soil: Microbiologists at New York University have found that the BT toxin in residues of genetically altered corn and rice crops persists in soils for up to 8 months and depresses microbial activity. And in another study, scientists in Oregon tested an experimental genetically engineered soil microbe in the laboratory and found it killed wheat plants when it was added to the soil in which they were grown.

6. Human health: Even as the biotech industry and government regulators have assured us that there is no reason to worry, a growing body of evidence indicates that genetic engineering can cause unintended changes to our food, making it less nutritious or even harmful. For example, a study in a 1998-99 issue of the Journal of Medicinal Food indicates that compared with nonmodified soy varieties, genetically altered, herbicide-tolerant varieties may contain lower levels of potentially beneficial plant estrogens. Another study, reported in a 1996 article in the International Journal of Health Services, warns that milk produced from cows injected with Monsanto's controversial genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (BGH) contains higher levels of a growth factor that may be linked to increased risk of both breast and gastrointestinal cancers in humans. Americans have been drinking unlabeled BGH-produced milk for years, but it has always been banned in Canada and Europe.

7. Hidden allergens: The foundation of genetic engineering is DNA, which directs the production of proteins. Proteins are also common sources of human allergies. When DNA from one organism is spliced into another, then, can it turn a nonallergenic food into one that will cause an allergic reaction in some people? Yes, reported researchers in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) in 1996. The case involved an attempt by the Iowa-based biotech seed company Pioneer Hi-Bred International to change the protein content of soybeans by adding a gene from the Brazil nut. When researchers tested the modified soybean on people with sensitivity to Brazil nuts (but no sensitivity to soybeans), they found it triggered an allergic reaction. Based on those findings, the company shelved development of the soybean. But, wrote the author of an editorial in the same NEJM issue, the next case could be less ideal, and the public less fortunate.

8. Religious and moral considerations: People who choose not to eat animals for religious or moral reasons face an almost impossible task with many genetically engineered foods. When cold-hardiness genes from flounder are spliced into tomatoes, or genes from chickens are added to potatoes for increased disease resistance, are those vegetables still, purely speaking, vegetables? And without mandatory labeling, how can people who object to eating any trace of meat know what they are getting?

9. Antibiotic resistance: Genetic engineers use antibiotic marker genes to help them transfer genetic coding from one life-form to another. But some scientists worry that this process could compound the already serious problem of antibiotic resistance in humans. Government scientists in Britain warn that the antibiotic resistance introduced into humans from genetically modified foods could render established medical treatments for such infections as meningitis and gonorrhea ineffective.

10. Indentured farmers: Because genetic engineering research is so expensive, it is largely controlled by for-profit corporations whose primary goal is return on investment, not public good. These corporations are rapidly buying up seed companies and gaining control of entire food-production systems and educational-research facilities. Farmers who use this patented technology, meanwhile, are prohibited from the time-honored tradition of saving seed to use the following season. They are forced into a costly cycle of corporate dependency.

For these and other reasons, we at Organic Gardening believe the risks of genetically engineered foods vastly outweigh any benefits. Biotechnology may indeed prove to be to the twenty- first century what the steam engine was to the nineteenth century and what the computer was to the twentieth. But nothing inherent in this technology assures that the changes will be good. The biggest concern is not what society knows about genetic manipulation but what it does not know. History, from DDT to Love Canal, has been strewn with the inadvertent consequences of "progress." It would be the height of hubris to assume that tinkering with evolution, in all its complexity, could have no unforeseen fallout.

The results of 50 years of chemical-based "high-tech" agriculture have made clear that we must rethink the way we grow food. The answer, we believe, lies in a return to sustainable, organic growing practices. Biotechnology is merely the next rung on the chemical-farming ladder, providing yet another artificial tool to help perpetuate the shortsighted and unsustainable practices of monoculture agriculture. Monsanto says its herbicide-tolerant crops reduce the need for tilling, preventing erosion. But smart organic practices?employing cover crops, mulches, and other natural techniques?control erosion just as efficiently without the use of dangerous chemicals, and they create healthy soil in the process.

Traditionally, farmers have had the closest connection to the natural world, and the deepest understanding of human dependency on the diversity of wild plants and animals. Yet genetic engineering, like the generation of chemical-based solutions before it, perpetuates an agricultural model far removed from nature. Today, the conventional farmer sits upon a giant tractor, inside an air-conditioned cab, moving through huge fields of a single crop. If the birds stop singing, will he hear the silence? If the monarch butterflies stop fluttering over the milkweed in the fencerow, will he even notice? Our children and grandchildren have just one future. Are we willing to risk it?

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