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This isn't a simple question.
For one thing, 'GM crops' can mean all manner of different
types and varieties of crop plant, into which a vast range of artificial bits
of DNA has been inserted.
For another thing, 'benefit' can mean all manner of
important societal parameters: good for finances, good for health, good for
quality of life, or good for future security.
And moreover, 'people' can mean all manner of unique sectors
of society: farmers, consumers, traders, corporations, share-holders,
individuals, communities, the literate, the illiterate, the young, the old, the
healthy, the unhealthy ...
This level of complexity hasn't helped generate any
meaningful science nor discussion on GM.
Indeed, a team of Swedish scientists noted that "the fragmented
knowledge on the social impacts of genetically modified (GM) crops is
contributing to the polarised debate on the matter".
To identify the research gaps, the scientists carried out a
literature review of 99 papers published since 2004 and summarised our current
knowledge of the social impacts of GM crops.
They focused on impacts materialising at farm-level, and
defined 'social impact' as "The consequences to human populations of any
public or private actions that alter the ways in which people live, work, play,
relate to one another, organise to meet their needs and generally cope as
members of society. The term also
includes cultural impacts involving changes to the norms, values, and beliefs
that guide and rationalise their cognition of themselves and their
society."
It's clear from their findings that the most-grown GM crops
(soya followed by maize), the most-grown GM trait (herbicide-tolerance), and
the countries growing the biggest areas of GM crops (USA followed by Brazil) aren’t
the most studied despite having potentially the biggest social impacts.
Over-generalisations seem to have diminished the value of
many of the publications: a significant proportion simply pooled data based on
different genetic modifications and crop types; some studies failed to discuss
specific locations; the existing empirical data on yield and farm finances were
re-used in many studies, thus exaggerating the amount of information actually
available; data on well-being were similarly repeated, and "frequently
discussed but rarely studied", so that they tended to be very general or
merely express future hopes or concerns; a large body of literature discussed
the framing of risk in relation to GM crops, but with little empirical
farm-level data.
Social disbenefits of GM crops appeared in a handful of
papers: accelerated deskilling of farmers, for example in India; patents on
seeds which have resulted in a profitable black-market of GM seeds, for example
in Brazil; the short-term nature of GM-based pest control, for example in
Argentina and India; production risks, for example herbicide-tolerant maize and
Bt cotton in South Africa.
Most studies claiming to look at 'social impacts' at farm
level are limited to the short-term economic outcomes.
Key findings of the review were that:
- Economic studies of GM crops present a misleadingly positive picture of social impacts as a whole.
- Today's governance of GM crops reinforces the corporate market dominance and reduces the possibility of benefit to small farmers.
- Social impacts on farmers in the major GM crop growing areas aren't known
OUR COMMENT
The answer to the question asked at the beginning seems to
run something like ...
Some GM crops may financially benefit some larger-scale
farmers in the short-term, and definitely benefit the large corporations
(thanks to government support), but no one's checked if there are real health,
quality of life or future security benefits for anyone anywhere in the world.
Put another way, there's lots of hype, wishful thinking and
opinion but very little science available to answer the question of benefit of
GM crops to people. No wonder the GM
debate is polarised! Perhaps we should
keep it that way for our own sake?
SOURCES
Klara Fischer, et al., 2015, Social
Impacts of GM Crops in Agriculture: A Systematic Literature Review,
Sustainability 7
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