Biotechnology

Yesterday ABC radio’s The World Today ran a story on GM wheat as a solution to Western Australia’s salinity problems. While a general solution to salinity I am sure it is not, a salt tolerant/more salt tolerant wheat variety must be a welcome addition to the mix of varieties currently available.

I was aware of research at the South Australian-based Centre for Plant Functional Genomics (ACPFG) focused on developing new drought and frost tolerant varieties.

According to discussions I had with these researchers in SA about a year ago, frost tolerance has become an issue because plant breeders have been selecting for early maturing varieties in order to escape potential summer drought. But, this has now exposed crops to frost during flowering.

There is apparently variation for traits for frost and salt tolerance in the “crossable” gene pool for wheat and barley, but there are far better genes in other plants and these would need to be transferred via GM methods.

I am well known as ‘a fan’ of GM food crops.

I often repeat the statistic that 90 per cent of Queensland and NSW cotton growers now plant GM and use on average 88 per cent less insecticide than those growing conventional varieties.

It is perhaps less well know that I am genuinely puzzled by many people’s aversion to GM.

I can understand and respect the ethical arguments, but the “I hate corporations therefore I am against GM” seems rather trite.

And the argument that Monsanto is all powerful just doesn’t wash. That all State governments (except Queensland which has a climate unsuitable for canola) have now passed legislation banning the commercial production of GM food crops (cotton exempt in NSW on the basis it is grown primarily for fibre even though about 35 percent of the vegetable oil we eat in Australia is from cotton seed) as a direct consequence of the successfully Greenpeace campaign against Monsanto’s GM canola would suggest to me that it is Greenpeace, not Monsanto, that has most pull with State governments.

I do crave some really honest and informed public discussion on GM.

“Monsanto is not alone in the research and development of crops designed to ward off destructive pests and disease, to require reduced pesticide applications, and to increase nutrition and yield in areas with traditionally poor showing for both.

Some of these pioneering life science research centers are for-profit firms. Some are government agencies. Others are academic institutions also working to find new ways to bolster the world’s food supply and alleviate hunger. In one form or another, these agriculture research operations are found in nations around the world: in China, Japan, Kenya, South Africa, Brazil, India, Australia, France, Switzerland, Germany, the U.S., etc. Burdensome local biases against intellectual freedom so necessary for science to thrive cause many of these firms to operate out of research centers located in the United States. One key component common to each grouping of scientists is how to achieve their goals without contributing more deleterious stress on the environment.

Regardless of the number of firms in the biotech field and despite the promise and products of this research, the harshest criticism, not praise, is reserved for Monsanto. …

Arguably, to characterize Monsanto’s century plus of labor as completely chivalrous, saintly and beyond reproach is to present only the “glass half full” portrait of the company and the chemical industry in general. The history of the field and firm is hardly free from legitimate environmental concerns. The most egregious include a horrific legacy of indifference in waste disposal. Admittedly most of the offensive practices by Monsanto and others took place during an era, before the birth of environmentalism in the 1970s, when newspaper empires embodied in the great dailies such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, when Members of Congress, the nations cities, factories and everyone else flushed raw sewage and piped every type of industrial and human waste into our waterways, forests, oceans and wild lands. It was an accepted practice with no evil to the earth intended. That’s just what everyone did without regard to the immediate or long-term consequences.”

The above text is from The International Foundation for the Conservation of Natural Resources website with the article at http://biotech.ifcnr.com/article.cfm?NewsID=500.

This is Part 2 of ‘GM Food Crops’. Part 1 was posted on 8th June.

Following are some views on GM food crops. What do you think and why?

“The Overall impact on pesticide use of just the GM crops currently available has been enormous. Reductions in pesticide use from just 8 GM crops in the US have been calculated at more than 21 million kg in the year 2001 alone. GM crops also increased yields by about 1 billion kg, saved more than $1billion in production costs, and reduced the use of tillage in agriculture. Virus-resistant papaya cultivars have saved the papaya industry on the ‘Big Island’ of Hawaii.

China has benefited more from agricultural biotech than any other country in the world, solely due to reduced insecticide use in Bt cotton.”

Rich Roush, September 2004

“Genetically modified food varieties by themselves are equally unlikely to solve the world’s food problems. In addition, virtually all GM crop production at present is of just four crops (soy-beans, corn, canola, and cotton) not eaten directly by humans but used for animal fodder, oil, or clothing, and grown in six temperate-zone countries or regions. Reasons are the strong consumer resistance to eating GM foods and the fact that companies developing GM crops can make money by selling their products to rich farmers in mostly affluent temperate-zone countries, but not by selling to poor farmers in developing tropical countries. Hence the companies have no interest in investing heavily to develop GM cassava, millet, or sorghum for farmers in developing nations.”

Jared Diamond, 6th January 2005 in http://www.truthout.org/docs_05/010805G.shtml

“GM crops at their heart are about corporate profits and this is the main objection that NGO organization have with them. They do not want people tied to corporations for their basic food. Witness the farmers in the US that are being prosecuted for saving seed. Also the results of cross-breeding with non-GM crops has not been fully tested and it is almost impossible to predict all the implications. Finally there is no way to stop bees from pollinating non-GM crops with GM crops’ pollen or stop birds eating GM seed and dropping it elsewhere. There have been cases of farmers being prosecuted for illegally growing patented crops that have drifted in from GM crops on the next farm.”

Ender, 27th May 2005 this blog

“GM crops may lead to corporate profits but then so do cardiovascular solutions, greenhouse management strategies,war and so on. What really needs to be said about GM crops is that they have become the sacraficial lamb for a raft of disgruntled, discontented minorities around the western world. It might be globalisation, green politics or organic farming that these people are so passionate about but their line in the sand as it were has become GM crops. Yet scientific discoveries (like the unravelling of DNA) will continue to forge new ways mankind to live smarter, healthier and more comfortable lives. And this is where leaders must recognise, pandering to a form of populism that fosters a distrust of expertise in technical issues is tantamount to leading or relying on ignorance.”

Chris Kelly, 30th May 2005 this blog

“GM food crops could be good, but they could also be bad. I’m torn. In a way I find it sad that we would need to come up with genetically modified crops to solve hunger issues around the world, I also think its good that science can solve difficult problems. I see GM foods as a high tech offering. As a means to solve problems, I wonder if there could be “better” solutions than GM foods to hunger issues, such as better land management, better understanding of climate, reduced social strife and better living standards in poorer countries. I put “better” in inverted commas because I know it is a subjective word, and can appreciate that other people will have a different idea of “better” to me.

I think that companies that push GM are doing so primarily for profit rather than helping to reduce hunger, which makes me skeptical of the benefits as companies report them (which isn’t to say that GM foods couldn’t reduce hunger). I don’t like the term ‘franken foods’ and find I have to filter through much of what I read in the papers on this issue because it is too polarised and emotional. I am similarly sceptical of many environment group claims on the issue. I don’t have a strong POSITION on this issue.”

Steve, 31st May 2005, this blog

“I have no ethical problems with GM foods. I suspect that both their present advantages and health risks have been massively overhyped.”

Ken Miles, 5th June 2005, this blog

What do you think?