Genetically Engineered Food: Promises & Perils

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Because of the many questions surrounding genetically modified food, in January 2001 more than 130 nations signed the Biosafety Protocol, a treaty that, among other things, would give countries the right to refuse imports of GMOs if they believe the shipments would harm their environment. The U.S. government opposes this concept, known as the Precautionary Principle, and tries to dispute it at every international forum possible.

With the strength of the U.S. government behind the biotech industry, unindustrialized nations and civil society groups are finding it difficult to secure careful evaluation and regulation of bioengineered food. Still, the battle seems far from over.

Consumers overseas and increasing numbers of consumers here in the United States are adamant that at the very least, GM food should be labeled as such. But the biotech industry and its supporters have always maintained that labeling would somehow stigmatize the product and have fought bitterly to prohibit it. Despite intense lobbying by pro-biotech forces, the European Union recently took steps to strengthen labeling requirements for food containing GMOs and began labeling animal feeds.

Clearly, enormous health, environmental and social issues are emerging as genetically engineered foods move into the marketplace. Norman C. Ellstrand, a geneticist at the University of California, Riverside, who studies how genes are transferred between domesticated and wild plants, advises us to proceed thoughtfully and Cautiously with genetic engineering. "Creating something just because we are now able to do so is an inadequate reason for embracing a technology." he wrote in the April 2001 issue of Plant Physiology. "If we have advanced tools for creating novel agricultural products, we should use the advanced knowledge from ecology and population genetics, as well as social sciences and humanities, to make mindful choices about how to create the products that are best for humans and our environment."

Considering that CMOs, once released, cannot be recalled to the lab and given the many thorny questions this radical technology raises. Ellstrand's advice that we be mindful is only prudent.

Karen Charman is an award-winning investigative journalist. She ponders the mysteries and implications of the politics of environmental, health and agricultural issues from the home she shares with her husband, illustrator Dave Channon, in the Catskill Mountains of New York.

Genetic Engineering's Bogus Basis

Biologist Barry Commoner sees fundamental problems with the technology of genetic engineering. In a February 2002 article in Harper's magazine, Commoner, who directs the Critical Genetics Project at Queens College in New York, writes that the scientific justification for genetic engineering is based on a now-discredited, 44-year-old theory.

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