Natural GM

July 2014

 

Leaf detail. CC photo by Lylir Horton on Flickr

At the same time as genetic engineers have been having fun building chains of nucleic acid (NA) molecules into artificial DNA sequences and using them to infect cells, scientists have been piecing together the story of natural genetic engineering.

Living cells have to adapt very quickly to changes in their environment. If they didn't, there wouldn't be much life on earth. Waiting for an appropriate Darwinian 'random genetic mutation' to crop up would be too slow. Since cells are intelligent enough to correct, as a matter of routine, between 99.9% and 99.99% of DNA errors, and if all else fails have the wisdom to self-destruct instead of reproducing the mistake, random genetic mutations are too rare to rely on for something as important as survival. 

Pest and pesticide problems

June 2014

CC photo by Roger Smith on Flickr

A recent report on GM crop-growing in America since 1996 prepared by the US Department of Agriculture made specific mention of the burgeoning problem of weeds resistant to glyphosate herbicide which is used on most GM crops (see THE GM DEBATE: 'OVER', OR BARELY STARTED? - June 2014).

 

The report came just too late to include the latest study on what may be the next big problem with GM crops: emerging pest-resistance to the 'Bt' insecticides generated by GM maize.

 

Pest-resistance has previously been found in laboratory studies, but these have been shrugged off as too artificial to extrapolate to what would actually happen in the field.

Famine amidst plenty

May 2014

Volunteers at the Greater Boston Food Bank in the US.

Comment

 

The UK Chief Scientific Adviser is supporting the Westminster Government and Environment Secretary, Owen Paterson, as they push for GM crop development in Britain [1].

 

He explained that, at present, “our supermarket shelves are groaning with food” but that in future “If we don't use GM the risk is people going unfed”. This seems to be a faithful repetition of the biotech industry line that only GM can provide the increased yields and crop adaptation to climate change needed to feed the future human population.

 

Interestingly, this reasoning was reported just days after the UK media had picked up on the shocking news that 'business' in our food banks is booming as never before.

 

In Newcastle alone, one food bank which was providing emergency food to 30 people a week less than a year ago is now supply 1,600 desperate people. The bank even has special packs for those unable to afford to use a cooker.

 

The reason?

 

Not lack of food, the supermarket shelves continue to groan: poverty.

The Minister for GM hype

November 2013



CC photo by CIAT on Flickr

Conservative MP, Zac Goldsmith, has dubbed Environment Secretary, Owen Paterson, the UK's “Minister for GM Hype”. 

Goldsmith describes Paterson's recent well-broadcast comments on the 'wicked' campaigners who voiced concerns about GM 'golden rice' [1] as “staggering”, and his suggestion that anyone has died because of their actions as “grotesque”.  Indeed, Goldsmith backs up his remarks with a concise summary of all the main issues surrounding the vitamin A producing rice, and concludes that

 

“Without the success story, GM relies on hype”. 

Unsafe GM maize a trigger for food shortages?

October 2012 
 

The reaction of the pro-GM lobby to the long-term experiment which found evidence of harm from NK603 GM maize and its companion herbicide, had all the hallmarks of a full-scale panic (see UNSAFE GM MAIZE A TRIGGER FOR US LABELLING - October 2012).

The more savvy have identified the biotech industry itself as being behind the furore. Biotech finger-prints were all over the scientists who immediately jumped up and tore the study apart in their customary ungentlemanly and unscientific fashion. Not to mention the industry-funded Science Media Centre which rushed to feed all the correct 'science' to the media, most of whom dutifully repeated it. Add to these, who knows what lobbyists (including, it seems, members of the GM assessment panel itself) were primed to make sure the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) took the right pro-GM decisions. All this happened in record time as befits a pre-planned and orchestrated suppression of unwelcome news. Just what the biotech industry PR boys do best.

However, here's another interesting angle to the bigger picture. What are the chances the order to kill the offending science with all possible speed came directly from the Whitehouse? A hotline from the US administration to key parties in Europe?

If that sounds far-fetched, consider the position the USA has got itself into.