Biotechnology

Banning genetically modified (GM) food is just another example of promoters of “incumbent products” seeking to restrict competition argues Calestous Juma in yesterday’s Financial Times:

Take coffee: in the 1500s Catholic bishops demonised coffee as “Satan’s drink” and urged a ban. It was competing with wine. In its defence, Pope Clement VIII proclaimed: “Why, this ‘Satan’s drink’ is so delicious it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it. We shall fool Satan by baptising it and making it a truly Christian beverage.”

More than a century later, coffee was pitted against tea as the incumbent English drink. To defeat the competition, King Charles II decreed the banning of coffeehouses in 1675 only to revoke the decision two days before it came into effect.

In Germany, coffee was outlawed or its sale severely restricted for economic reasons. “It is disgusting to notice the increase in the quantity of coffee used by my subjects, and the like amount of money that goes out of the country in consequence. My people must drink beer. His Majesty was brought up on beer, and so were his ancestors,” declared Frederick the Great in 1777.

Historical cases of technological competition were limited in their reach. Today’s global economy demands that governments find ways to ensure that the benefits of new technologies are widely shared. Judicial rulings will safeguard the integrity of international trading rules. But they will not guarantee consumer enthusiasm for products that threaten their settled ways.

Calestous Juma was writting about a WTO finding, published earlier this week, that the current European Union moratorium on GM food crops breaches trade rules, click here for earlier post.

I missed the big news of two days ago, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has issued a preliminary report (which I have not yet read) indicating that the European Union (EU) moratoriums on GM food crops constitute a breach of WTO trade rules.

You can read about it at ABC Online, click here also at AgBioWorld, click here, and Agribusiness Freedom, click here.

But perhaps the best commentary came from a friend in the US who emailed me:

“The WTO has rejected the anti-scientific claims that EU governments are using to defend their populist policies. This was a decision about scientific evidence with trade implications, not about trade where there is scientific uncertainty. Even the EU’s own scientists have argued that the scientific evidence strongly supports the safety of these crops.

Otherwise, the anti-GM types are essentially trying (and probably successfully) to paint this as a purely technical decision driven by and supporting WTO policies favoring globalization and oppressing local rule.

In every case where anti-GM claims have met the hard rules of evidence of a high level court rather than the rumour mongering of public opinion (or the odd local judge), they have lost, whether for Percy Schmeiser, the New Zealand Royal Commission, or now the WTO.

Greenpeace, FOE and others have had their days in court, and lost.

This is a record equaled in modern times perhaps only by those other popular forces of anti-scientific irrationality, the advocates of creationism/intelligent design.”

This is the 10th year that GM cotton has been grown in Australia. Interestingly I have seen no mention of this milestone in the popular press or online.

GM canola was to be the next GM crop approved for commercial production in Australia but Greenpeace ran a campaign against it. We now have moratoriums banning new GM food crops – cotton exempt on the basis it is grown primarily for fibre – in all states except Queensland where it is too hot to grow canola.

The state government regulations banning this new technology are dumb*, click here for an example.

The general public has no real understanding of the issues, and neither do most bloggers judging from comment earlier in the week at John Quiggin’s site. In this post on global warming he suggests there has been sensible discussion in the Australian media on GM issues – but not on global warming.

I would suggest Greenpeace has just done a good snow job on most Australians – in part because the media and most bloggers haven’t researched the issue, encouraged intelligent debate and discussion.

Most of the rest of the world is planting more GM – even Europe.

On Monday (23rd January) e-news journal farmonline provided an update on GM cotton globally:

Biotech cotton varieties were planted on an estimated 9.7 million hectares in seven countries in 2005-06, accounting for 28pc of world cotton area this season.

Biotech varieties appear to confer advantages in efforts to raise yields, hence their growing popularity.

The average yield with biotech (GM) varieties is estimated at 967 kilograms of lint per hectare, compared with a world yield estimated at 725 kg/ha.

Biotech cotton will account for approximately 37pc of world cotton production and trade in 2005-06.

The US was the first country in which biotech cotton varieties were approved for commercial production in 1996.

Area planted to biotech varieties in the US increased to 82pc of 5.5 million hectares in 2005-06.

Herbicide-resistant and stacked gene varieties having both herbicide and insecticide resistant characters accounted for 90pc of the US biotech cotton area in 2005.

Pure insect resistant varieties were planted on less than 10pc of the US biotech cotton area.

Dr David Tribe has lots of information on GM everything at his blog, click here.

……………

* I’m sure there is a better word than ‘dumb’? Suggestions?

My 16 year old daughter told me some weeks ago that she had just heard on local FM radio that “the government” was going to fund an independent assessment into the safety of GM food.

What she didn’t know was that the WA government is going to funding a known anti-GM activist with no laboratories or expertise to undertake studies that require both expert knowledge and facilities.

Dr Rick Roush an Australian based at the University of California was one of several signatories to the following letter of protest sent to the Premier of Western Australia on 5th December:

The Hon Dr Geoff Gallop, BEc MA MPhil DPhil MLA

Dear Premier Gallop,

We were shocked and disappointed to see media reports that Agriculture Minister Kim Chance will fund a long-term animal feeding trial with the Institute for Health and Environmental Research in Adelaide. We note that Mr. Chance’s website confirms your government will fund an “independent’ study to gain data on the safety or otherwise of GM food crops.

There is universal support among all major scientific societies around the world for the safety of the regulatory system and all currently registered GM foods. Contrary to the assertions in Mr. Chance’s media release, these current food assessments (including those by Food Standards Australia New Zealand) do actively and intensively review the possibility that “when a gene is taken out of one organism and put into another, the protein expressed by that gene may be different.”

There is substantial scientific evidence confirming the safety of currently approved biotech crops, and absent new questions, there is little or no basis for further animal studies. Nobody, of course, will object to properly conducted further studies if your government wishes to fund them. Our concern is that Mr. Chance has apparently decided to award funds for this research to a group with a well-known agenda against GM crops, and worse, apparently with no technical expertise, no reputable scientific track record and no facilities suitable for conducting the study!

In his media release, Mr. Chance expressed concern that adverse effects from a novel type of GM pea “had only come to light recently, despite 10 years of research and development.” In fact, the pea project has been underway for ten years precisely because GM research is undertaken in great detail and products are not rushed to market. Mr. Chance seems unaware that CSIRO has been conducting other safety tests on this crop for a number of years, including some in the 1990s in collaboration with anti-GM critic Arpad Pusztai; the detrimental effects found were minimal (citation below). The facts remain both that the current review process did find the problems in the GM peas and that no foods with this specific insecticide resistance gene are grown anywhere in the world other than in well-controlled, small-scale experiments.

Most of us became aware of the Institute for Health and Environmental Research (SA) in 2003, when their leading figure, Dr. Judy Carmen, toured around with UK activist Dr Mae-Wan Ho to speak against GM crops and food safety. Ho has a relentlessly anti-science agenda against GM crops (and modern Darwinian theory).

The Institute for Health and Environmental Research seems to consist of two other people in addition to Carmen, and a website. None of them have scientific records in conducting or analyzing long term feeding studies, certainly no refereed papers in this area (or many in any other area of science), which is the usual measure of scientific quality.
Moreoever, the bios on the IHER website reveal the clear anti-biotech bias of all three.

We are sure that there are far better qualified and unprejudiced scientists in Australia, including in Western Australia, who could carry out this research. We are therefore alarmed at an apparent lack of adherence to scientific norms in awarding this project to the Institute for Health and Environmental Research. Following reports that Mr. Chance has previously declared that he would not eat GM food, we are deeply disturbed about the objectivity of the agenda being pursued by Mr.
Chance.

In sum, Mr. Chance’s decision gives us great concern for the respect your government shows for scientific enquiry, peer review, international standards, and the processes of competitively awarding research funds.
We look forward to hearing from you that proper, internationally upheld standards will be observed in awarding this research competitively to qualified researchers, if the research is to be undertaken at all.

Sincerely,

Prof. Dr. Klaus Ammann, Honorary Professor University of Bern, Director of the Bern Botanic Garden

Professor Bruce M. Chassy, Campus Biotechnology Center, University of Illinois, Urbana

Professor Bruce D. Hammock, Distinguished Professor of Entomology & Cancer Research Center, University of California, Davis

Dr. Martina Newell-McGloughlin, Director University of California Systemwide Biotechnology Research and Education Program, and Co-Director NIH Training Program in Biomolecular Technology

Professor Vivian Moses, CropGen, London

Dr. Alan McHughen, Biotechnology Specialist University of California, Riverside

Dr. Drew L. Kershen, Earl Sneed Centennial Professor of Law, University of Oklahoma

Dr. Tom DeGregori , Professor of Economics, University of Houston

Dr. Alex Avery, Director of Research, Center for Global Food Issues, Hudson Institute

Dr. Rick Roush, Director of University of California Integrated Pest Management and Sustainable Agriculture Programs

Dr. Henry Miller, MD, Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University [Founding director of the U.S. FDA’s Office of Biotechnology,1989-1993]

Dr. Piero Morandini, Department of Biology, University of Milan

Professor C. S. Prakash, Director, Center for Plant Biotechnology Research, Tuskegee University

Reference Cited

Pusztai A, Grant G, Bardocz S, Alonso R, Chrispeels MJ, Schroeder HE, Tabe LM, Higgins TJV. Expression of the insecticidal bean alpha-amylase inhibitor transgene has minimal detrimental effect on the nutritional value of peas fed to rats at 30% of the diet. J Nutr 1999; 129: 1597-603. end of letter

I worry, given the extent to which government and the media are so quick to embrace pseudo-environmental causes in the name of ‘independent’ science.

BY ROGER KALLA
…NOT ON ENVIRONMENT

Man is to step on the Moon again a decade from now in preparation for the huge leap to Mars. This has been seen by some as another reflection of the hubris of the Bush administration seriously out of touch with the pressing global threats facing our planet and humankind. However, Australian agriculture and environment stand to make some gains from spin-offs from this space exploration program.

The announcement made by President Bush in 2004 that the USA aims to reinvigorate its stalled space exploration program has been met by mixed responses and even seen by some as a prime example of technology escapism.

In order to supply a crew for the 7 month minimum return trip to Mars with oxygen, water and medicines, a very efficient closed loop food production and waste management recycling system would be required. Some alternatives are being explored in the Advanced Life Support program of the NASA Specialized Center of Research and Training at Purdue University in preparation for the mission to Mars.

Food production technologies that could come in handy for the intrepid space travellers are already here and now. Milk can be produced by bovine mammary glands grown in culture, meat by sheets of animal muscle tissue grown in dishes , essential oils like omega 3 polyunsaturated fats from genetically modified canola, orange juice from juice sacs grown in bioreactors, and edible vaccines against influenza or any other nasty bug from hydroponically grown tomatoes.

But perhaps the solution is to think about agriculture inside the square or vat. In the not to distant future we might need not only food manufacturing factories but food producing factories that are based on animal and plant cells as the smallest production unit rather than multicellular organisms like chickens, oranges, tomatoes or fish.

The spin offs from NASA’s second space exploration program will no doubt surpass innovations such as the personal computer, mobile phone and microwave oven that were developed to fulfil some of the requirements of the first NASA program. This time around the unintended spin offs might deliver new technologies for sustainable production of high value foods and medicines not requiring us to mine our ‘golden soils’ to receive our ‘wealth for toil’.

I remember reading, a couple of years ago, when I was just getting interested in GM food issues, that there had been problems with babies in the Philippines from canned baby food containing GM product. I remember staying up most of one night trying to get to the bottom of the story, to find out that it was a ‘Greenpeace hypothesis’.

A couple of days ago I asked The Australian newspaper if they were interested in an opinion piece from me covering Dr Charles Benbrook’s claims that GM technology is failing in the US with record herbicide usage and out-of-control weeds, read my blog piece by clicking here.

Anyway, they published the piece by me today, click here to read it.

Journalist Rick Wallace phoned after I had sent off the piece interested in my claim that Victorian dairy farmers were feeding their cows GM soy. I suggested he get the full story from David Tribe.

It seems he also phoned Jeremy Tager from Greenpeace – fair enough – except that Jeremy seems to mostly just make it up as he goes along. Cop this for a claim from Jeremy in today’s The Australian:

Greenpeace genetic engineering campaigner Jeremy Tager said the only five independent studies of the effect of GM foods on stock had found immune deficiencies, failure to gain weight and damage to certain organs.

“We are absolutely opposed to GM stock feeds,” he said. “The question of how cattle digest GM feeds is something that needs serious study.”

How could about 370,000 tonnes of GM soy be imported into Australia last year, for animal and human consumption, if there was a problem with it? Why would the Europeans import GM soy worth $858 million last year if there was a problem with it? Foods have to pass standards – even if Greenpeace don’t.

But hey, if there really is a study that has been done somewhere that provides some evidence to support Jeremy’s claim that GM soy damages organs, affects the immune system, stock fed it don’t put on weight, or anything else, let me know. I will publish the information at this blog.