Guest Post by Colin Todhunter
Many scientists lobbying for the deregulation of agricultural biotechnology ‘new genomic techniques’ (NGTs) in the European Union have either direct or indirect interests in commercialising and marketing new genetically modified organisms (GMOs). They have patents or patent applications or other connections to the seed industry.
That is the conclusion of a September 2022 investigatory report commissioned by the Greens/EFA in the European Parliament – Behind the smokescreen: Vested interests of EU scientists lobbying for GMO deregulation. These scientists will benefit financially or in terms of career development, either personally or through their organisations.
FOAM Organics Europe, an umbrella organisation for organic food and farming, notes that a group of 91 international scientists and policy experts have released a public statement opposing the use of the term ‘precision breeding’ to describe gene editing, on the grounds that it is “technically and scientifically inaccurate and therefore misleads parliament, regulators and the public” because gene editing is neither precise nor is it breeding.
FOAM quotes Claire Robinson, from industry watchdog GMWatch, who says:
It is not only misleading but also dangerous, as deregulating these new techniques will have serious socio-economic consequences as well as potentially serious impacts on health and the environment.”
The European Court of Justice recognised this in 2018, ruling that organisms obtained with new genetic modification techniques must be regulated under the EU’s existing GMO laws. But there has been intense lobbying from the agriculture biotech industry to weaken the legislation: the industry had by late 2021 spent at least €36 million lobbying the EU.
The push for GMOs and their newer NGT versions is relentless – despite the risks and despite most of the public not wanting them. That is according to research by Pew Research Center conducted between October 2019 and March 2020.
For instance, in Russia, 70% of the public regard GM foods as generally unsafe to eat. The figure is 62% in Italy, 58% in India and 57% in South Korea.
In reviewing research findings into public perceptions of GMOs, GMWatch concludes that many consumers do not want GM (including gene-edited) foods and a large majority want to see gene-edited foods assessed for safety and labelled.
The case for GM is weak, despite incessant industry PR about GM being necessary to feed the world. GMWatch notes that GM crops do not increase intrinsic yield and, in some cases, they decrease it (noted in the book GMO Myths and Truths). Moreover, world hunger is not caused by a lack of agricultural productivity but by poverty and an inherently unjust globalised food system.
Yet, around the world, the industry’s drive to get GM crops into fields persists. In India, the country’s apex regulatory body recently sanctioned GM mustard for cultivation. This would be India’s first GM food crop.
This, despite a public interest litigation (PIL) before the Supreme Court to prevent cultivation and the widespread rejection of GM mustard by farmers’ organisations. Something not lost on Ashwani Mahajan, national co- convenor of Swadeshi Jagran Manch, a body that promotes self-reliance and associated with the country’s ruling BJP.
He states on Twitter:
WHAT AN IRONY! Government is yet to find a respected farmer leader of repute to support GM Mustard and they say that they are bringing GM Mustard in farmers’ interests.”
Ashwani refers to a letter written by farmers leaders to PM Modi urging him to immediately put a stop to GM mustard.
The concerns set out in the letter by farmers’ leaders have been elucidated in the numerous affidavits as part of the GM mustard PIL before the Supreme Court (the online article Prominent Lawyer Prashant Bhushan Urges Indian Government to Stop Commercialisation of GM Mustard provides an overview of some of the key evidence).
The letter objects to the decision of the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee to approve the environmental release of GM HT Mustard, hybrid DHM-11 and its parental lines. These parental lines will be distributed to private and public sector researchers to develop other hybrids.
The farmers leaders say to PM Modi:
The farmers are already in distress! This HT (herbicide-tolerant) mustard will further coerce them towards the usage of a deadly herbicide (glufosinate) which will only benefit large agro-chemical corporations like Bayer, the producer of this herbicide. Your Ministry’s regulators have made various ‘claims’ in favour of the release of DHM-11, all of which lack logic or science.”
The letter states that independent scientists have exposed claims about yield increases through GM HT mustard to be hollow and unfounded. Data has been rigged and manipulated and protocols have been severely compromised:
It is unscientific that the Government of India and its regulators are parroting the false claims of the crop developers… yields are going to decline if this GM mustard is approved – that is because this GM mustard is a low-yielder compared to other non-GM varieties and hybrids in the market.
It is often stated that this GM mustard is an Indian creation. But the letter makes it clear it is a Bayer construct, a patented technology of Bayer Crop Science, and this has been concealed from the people of India.
Independent experts who have looked into the biosafety data submitted by the crop developer at Delhi University have clearly pointed out that GM mustard has not been tested rigorously and adequately and has never been tested as a herbicide tolerant crop.
The farmers’ leaders say:
What is also important to note is that glufosinate is a dangerous herbicide, like glyphosate. It is irresponsible for the regulatory body to recommend environmental release, and then ask for testing to be done post-environmental release, knowing fully well that GM technology is a living technology, irreversible and uncontrollable.”
Supporters of GM mustard say it will help reduce the edible oil import bill of India. But India is nearly self-sufficient when it comes to mustard demand and supply. The letter also discusses adverse trade implications of allowing GMOs to contaminate India’s food supply.
PM Modi is also made aware that GM crops like DHM-11 will contaminate neighbouring crops by outcrossing. He is asked: How will the purity of seeds and crops be maintained and protect organic certification? And given that GM Mustard is herbicide tolerant, there is the strong possibility that farmers will end up on a financially costly health- and environment-damaging chemical treadmill.
The letter states that GM technology is unproven and heavily dependent on agro-chemicals. It says GM crops will be an unnecessary addition of pressure into a system that is already squeezing the farmer dry, adding to the riskiness in farming.
Moreover:
GM crops clearly are a relinquishment of our sovereignty to corporate interests that will threaten our food supply and our ability to control our own food chain.
India is a centre for diversity for mustard and several high-level official committees have time and time again recommended against transgenic technologies in crops for which the country is the centre of origin or centre of diversity.
The letter concludes with the warning:
If the Government of India does not put the interests of ordinary citizens like us in policy-making around such hazardous technologies, we will be forced to step up our struggles to protect our interests.
Such action is necessary because farmers and the public are rejecting GMOs but compromised scientists and policy makers are promoting a risky technology with unproven need to help boost industry profit by facilitating market capture and the displacement of indigenous systems of production.
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Eat bugs!
If you’ve been vaxxed then you now ARE a GMO. 🙂
Just Sayin’
They probably patented it, so now they own your genes – and your ass – and some venal shyster whore of a judge will find in their favor in a court of “law”.
Every crop which is cultivated for human consumption is a GMO, either through selective breeding and hybridization (which changes the genetic makeup of the plant) or by laboratory manipulation of the plant’s genome. Those arguing vehemently against GMO’s need to make the distinction. If not for selective breeding, our corn cobs would still be two inches long and watermelons would be the size of baseballs.
That’s how we have modern wheat with 48 chromosomes, that some people can’t digest effectively, from einkorn (original wheat) which has only 14 chromosomes. I would call that a genetic modification, even though it is never referred to as GMO wheat. The process is different but the result is the same, something that man has manipulated that is not as vital and life supporting as the original.
Simply wrong. One is manipulating natural husbandry, the other is unnaturally manipulating genes.
Selective breeding is what could occur naturally through plant or animal sex. The way it was done for many millennia.
GMO is (for the most part) artificially inserting genes in a manner that would never occur naturally through sex. Mainly, from ENTIRELY not sexually compatible species. The blending would NEVER occur naturally no matter how many times they were attempted to breed.
Living things have systems that reject extreme changes to the genome, for reasons and by mechanisms we can’t fully understand. GMO gene insertions bypass these systems. Also, the inserted gene does not always (in fact rarely) just change the targeted trait, gene expression also often makes other changes not anticipated or understood.
You are right.
Genetically modified is not hybridization to improve a crop. Hybridized crops can replicate themselves though sometimes the seed will revert or show characteristics of earlier stock plants (known as F1, F2 and so on). This can happen naturally through pollination, while gmo engineered seed will not do that, most plants are sterile.
Genetically modification was to allow herbicides to be sprayed over the top of certain crops.
That’s apples and oranges and doesn’t hold up to current cell and molecular biology knowledge. Selective breeding does not have the same unintended consequences risk as CRISPR-Cas9 or knockouts.
The links that merely say “home” all go to “slow food” sites.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_Food
https://slowfoodusa.org/
http://www.slowfoodboston.org/