ARCHIVE NEWS (September 2007). Please note: links may not be active.
Science watchdog, Econexus, has prepared a petition calling for a moratorium on all EU promotion of agrofuels.
Biofuels: A Sustainable Sham
(ARCHIVE NEWS - MAY 2007. Please note links may not be working)
Anyone who has opened a newspaper or magazine this year will have read a great deal of hype about biofuels. America is determined to reduce its petrol consumption by 20 percent within a decade by producing 35 billion gallons of biofuel a year. the EU Biofuels Directive requires that all member states have a blend of 5.7 percent biofuel in their road transport fuels by 2010. Biofuels are the clean, green, sustainable, oil-saving, pollution-free, climate-friendly saviours of mankind especially in the Developing Worlds.
Anyone who has opened a newspaper or magazine this year will have read a great deal of hype about biofuels. America is determined to reduce its petrol consumption by 20 percent within a decade by producing 35 billion gallons of biofuel a year. the EU Biofuels Directive requires that all member states have a blend of 5.7 percent biofuel in their road transport fuels by 2010. Biofuels are the clean, green, sustainable, oil-saving, pollution-free, climate-friendly saviours of mankind especially in the Developing Worlds.
Biofuels: the Sums Don't Add up
(ARCHIVE NEWS - MAY 2007. Please note links may not be working)
Biofuels are shaping up to become a 'GM success story' of the sustainable, economical, clean, safe, environmentally friendly, solution to our energy problems and global warming (see BIOFUELS: A SUSTAINABLE SHAM)
But, what does the bottom line actually look like?
Biofuels are shaping up to become a 'GM success story' of the sustainable, economical, clean, safe, environmentally friendly, solution to our energy problems and global warming (see BIOFUELS: A SUSTAINABLE SHAM)
But, what does the bottom line actually look like?
Making things happen
... just by thinking about them?
This isn't sorcery, it's science. Such effects have been measured repeatedly.
A long-term, on-going experiment has shown that when major events draw the world's attention to the same point, the shared thoughts are powerful enough to make patterns emerge in random number generators (1).
When people practice transcendental meditation, the activity of the nerves in their brains (as measured by EEG) becomes coherent, showing hyper-synchrony and rhythmicity(2). This brain coherence during meditation has been linked to field-effects in the environment. When large groups get together to practice transcendental meditation, increased positivity in their surroundings has been measured in several experiments. Positivity means less crime, fewer road accidents, reduced alcohol and cigarette use, rising employment, and lower pollution levels(3).
It is within our power to make essential, healthy changes in the great systems that dominate our world. We can free our lives of the threat from food diseased by foreign DNA. All we need to do is put our shared attention on a GM-free Scotland, and keep it there.
Don't think your one tiny mind is too small to matter.
(1)Global Consciousness Project (on-going)
(2)Jean-Paul Banquet (1972) Electroencephaly and Clinical Neurophysiology 33
(3)Dillbeck M.C. et al. (1987) Journal of Mind and Behaviour 8
“If evil minds combine, good minds have to co-operate and combat them.”When people share intentions and emotions, their coherent thoughts spread ripples of coherence through the environment.
(APJ Abdul Kalam, Former President of India, 2.12.2008)
This isn't sorcery, it's science. Such effects have been measured repeatedly.
A long-term, on-going experiment has shown that when major events draw the world's attention to the same point, the shared thoughts are powerful enough to make patterns emerge in random number generators (1).
When people practice transcendental meditation, the activity of the nerves in their brains (as measured by EEG) becomes coherent, showing hyper-synchrony and rhythmicity(2). This brain coherence during meditation has been linked to field-effects in the environment. When large groups get together to practice transcendental meditation, increased positivity in their surroundings has been measured in several experiments. Positivity means less crime, fewer road accidents, reduced alcohol and cigarette use, rising employment, and lower pollution levels(3).
It is within our power to make essential, healthy changes in the great systems that dominate our world. We can free our lives of the threat from food diseased by foreign DNA. All we need to do is put our shared attention on a GM-free Scotland, and keep it there.
Don't think your one tiny mind is too small to matter.
(1)Global Consciousness Project (on-going)
(2)Jean-Paul Banquet (1972) Electroencephaly and Clinical Neurophysiology 33
(3)Dillbeck M.C. et al. (1987) Journal of Mind and Behaviour 8
A special message from Dr. Pusztai
 |
| Dr. Arpad Pusztai |
“When all scientists who dare to live up to their noble profession's highest standards and tell the truth have been eliminated ... it will be too late to act.”These are the words of the first scientist who found evidence of harm from GM and who tried to warn the world about it. Since then, many more honest scientists have suffered the same fate, but we have a democratic right to demand the truth.
Scotland and all her citizens deserve better than what is meted out to us all by a non-caring and undemocratic political and economical establishment. I came to Britain in 1956 fleeing from a tyrannical Soviet system because at that time this country was a shining beacon of freedom where people could freely express their ideas and wishes and the politicians did actually willingly listen to these and eventually accepted most of them. Unfortunately, this is so no longer. We are made by our masters to go down a road, which will very likely lead to disastrous consequences from which there is no return to normality.
Remember what happened to Percy Schmeiser in Canada! When you will be sued by a biotech company for finding their gene in your crop regardless whether you planted it or not because it came there against your will by genetic pollution from a neighbouring farm which grew such GM crop it will be too late for you to do something about it. When the whole countryside will be quiet and sterile because everything not ''productive'', the weeds (including your non-GM crop), the insects and the birds have been eliminated for good, it will be too late for taking correcting action. When all scientists who dare to live up to their noble profession's highest standards and tell the truth have been eliminated and only those who sell their conscience to Mammon are left, it will be too late to act.
Seek out and cherish those who try their best to represent your real interests and find those politicians who will stand up for you ... Support them because none of the others will support you!
Arpad Pusztai
Biofuels: bad science, bad maths, bad policy, bad ethics
The dilemma
The dilemma is that we have developed a global infrastructure based on oil, which has allowed us to live in the most luxurious civilisation ever known. In our modern world 95 percent of transportation, 95 percent of goods in our shops, and 95 percent of our food products depend on oil. Oil allows us to maintain an available food supply of barely more than two days by just-in-time deliveries from all over the world. To farm a single cow and deliver it to market requires six barrels of oil.
Our oil consumption has been rising steadily for decades. The International Energy Agency forecasts that our oil use will rise from its present 84 million barrels a day to 116 million barrels by 2030. But, Geologists (mainly working in the heart of the oil industry) tell us our oil is running out. They foresee oil supplies diminishing at 3 percent every year, with a cumulative impact adding up to a 50 percent reduction by 2030 (the same year as our consumption is forecast to have risen by 38 percent).
NOTE
The meaning of the term 'biofuel'. 'Biofuels' refer to several technologies which produce alternative fuels from a variety of sources.
First generation biofuels are available now:
Original material derived from GM-free Scotland News articles.
Our oil consumption has been rising steadily for decades. The International Energy Agency forecasts that our oil use will rise from its present 84 million barrels a day to 116 million barrels by 2030. But, Geologists (mainly working in the heart of the oil industry) tell us our oil is running out. They foresee oil supplies diminishing at 3 percent every year, with a cumulative impact adding up to a 50 percent reduction by 2030 (the same year as our consumption is forecast to have risen by 38 percent).
The biotech solution
The biotech industry solution is, of course, GM. Realising that there could be a multi-billion dollar-a-year biofuel industry out there in the fields which could be hyped to provide up to 25 percent of the world's energy within 20 years, the GM crops which were going to feed hungry people became destined to feed hungry vehicles. And of course, fuel from crops which are genetically modified, can effectively be patented.
Apparently overnight, Biofuels became a 'GM success story' of sustainable, economical, clean, safe, environmentally friendly alternative to oil, providing the solution to our energy problems and global warming.
The EU and US response was to introduce incentives for agri-fuels, including mandatory targets, publicly funded subsidies, and tax breaks. Billions of dollars are being invested in agri-fuel plantations, refineries and the extensive associated infrastructure. The implementation has forged ahead at breakneck speed, without any proof that biofuels will actually supply our energy needs, nor that they can ever mitigate global warming, nor with any due consideration of the potential damage to the environment and the people.
The meaning of the term 'biofuel'. 'Biofuels' refer to several technologies which produce alternative fuels from a variety of sources.
First generation biofuels are available now:
- BIOETHANOL is an alcohol-based fuel produced from fermented sugar or starch. Sugar-cane and maize are the most prominent crops used, but sugar beet, wheat and barley are current options. Bioethanol can be blended with petrol.
- BIODIESEL is manufactured from vegetable, animal, or waste oil. The most prominent source is palm oil. Biodiesel is usually blended with conventional diesel.
- BIOGAS is derived from bacterial digestion of waste or other organic material.
Second generation biofuels are under development:
- LIGNO-CELLULOSIC ETHANOL is produced by digestion and fermentation of grass-crops or wood pulp.
- COAL-BASED DIESEL is what it sounds like, diesel produced from coal.
The Reality of the Biotech Solution
What the biotech industry doesn't want to know is the uncomfortable conclusions scientists have come to about biofuels.
A study by the University of Minnesota published in 2006 concluded that bioethanol from maize offered a modest net energy gain of 25% over oil, suggesting a release of 12% less greenhouse gases, while biodiesel from soya offered a more promising 93% net energy gain with 41% reduction in greenhouse gases. Their calculations took into account the direct agricultural, processing and transport expenses and useful by-products, but not the environmental damage nor increased demand on land and water. When viewing the bigger picture, it concluded that, if America's entire maize and entire soya crops were used to make biofuel, they would contribute less than 3% of current gasoline and diesel usage. This would put a serious strain on food supplies and prices.
A second study by Cornell University published in 2005 came to very unpromising conclusions.
Regarding bioethanol from the various sources:
- maize requires an input of 29% more fossil-fuel energy than the net energy it can produce
- switchgrass fermentation requires an input of 45% more fossil-fuel energy than the net energy it can produce
- wood fermentation requires 57% more fossil fuel energy than the net energy it can produce.
Regarding biodiesel from various sources:
- soya requires 27% more fossil fuel energy than the net energy it can produce
- sunflower requires 118% more fossil fuel energy than the net energy it can produce.
Again, all direct costs were factored in, but environmental damage was not, so the bigger picture is much than their figures suggest.
The global reality of biofuel arithmetic was spelled out by the National Farmers Union of Canada at the beginning of the 2007:
- if the world's entire supply of oilseeds were turned to biodiesel production, it would provide one sixth of the diesel fuel we currently consume
- if the world's entire supply of corn and wheat were turned to bioethanol production it would supply less than one third of our gasoline needs
- if a more realistic 10% of land was turned to fuel production, it would yield, at best, 2-3% of our liquid fuel needs
- in our current situation where in six of the last seven years we have consumed more grains and oil seeds than we produced and during the last decade the world's crop land area has been static or declining while our population grows, using land and water to feed cars will starve people.
The World Wildlife Fund pointed out the fundamental flaw in the use of biofuels to tackle global warming: change of land use. Brazil is the world's model for successful conversion to bioethanol. Using sugarcane, it is possible to produce eight times as much fuel energy as it costs to grow and process. However, the major source (80%) of greenhouse gases comes not from petrol but from the carbon released by deforestation. Destroying a hectare of forest which can absorb 20 tons of CO2 and replanting it will sugar-cane to save 13 tons of CO2 does not add up to a reduction in greenhouse gases.
Ecologist reporter, Mark Anslow, pointed out the many flaws in industry's optimistic calculations of biofuel energy advantages. For example:
- because oil is a super-concentrated form of energy, adding ethanol dilutes it. This means a larger volume of fuel is needed for the same energy output
- hot weather will reduce bioethanol efficiency because the fuel will evaporate; cold weather will reduce biodiesel efficiency because it will have to be pre-heated before use
- bioethanol and biodiesel are solvents and will result in faster wear and tear of equipment
- useful by-products like glycerin which is used by the cosmetic industry and CO2 which is used by the soft drinks industry will easily saturate the market and become an expensive waste problem
- the animal feed generated as a by-product is not good quality
- it will take 14 years (the life-expectancy of a car) for our present petrol-fueled cars to be replaced by ethanol-fueled models; this is far too long
- there are multiple sources of pollution inherent in biofuel production: pesticides and fertilisers from intensive crop monoculture; the refinement of ethanol produces nitrous oxides (a greenhouse gas three hundred time more potent than CO2 ), carbon monoxide and volatile organic compounds (VOCs, these are ozone precursors and damage human health) and methane.
Friends of the Earth point out the additional danger that marginal land, which is susceptible to erosion, will be put back into intensive crop production, and washed away. It also has concerns over the increased cultivation of maize which uses more fertiliser than soya, and over the increasing use of pesticides necessary after continuous maize crop cultivation. An endless succession of GM crop varieties containing increasingly stacked genes for toxins, and genetic pollution of our food is inevitable.
The only winners in the biofuel game were described by the author of the Cornell University study:
“The (US) government spends more than $3 billion a year to subsidize ethanol production ... the vast majority of the subsidies do not go to farmers but to large ethanol-producing corporations”.The goal of biofuel production seems to be to allow Americans to continue to live their petrol-dependent lifestyle and to drive their SUVs, but since the amount of grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV gas tank with ethanol could feed one person for a year, this is clearly unnecessary, wasteful and unethical.”
The National Farmers Union of Canada summed up biofuel production as “publicly subsidized vaporization of food stocks” which are (temporarily) good for farmers, but “bad physics, bad biology and bad policy”.
In 2007, the United Nations acknowledged the impossibility of using agricultural land and water for fuel without risking mass starvation. Its report questioned the global effects of large-scale biofuel crop production, highlighting the inevitable forest clearance and ensuing climate, environmental and social damage, plus the loss of precious farm-land and implications for water supplies. The new drive to pour our staple food and feed crops into cars became revealed as a recipe for disaster. Finally, the UN recommended a five-year moratorium on biofuel production, to allow time for appropriate technologies to be devised and protective regulatory structures to be put in place.
By 2008, rocketing food-prices and mounting evidence that the drive for biofuels will only push food prices higher, are opening our eyes to the true implications of this 'infinitely' replaceable source of energy. Although America continues, predictably, to claim that the contribution of biofuels to food price inflation has been a minimal 3%, this has been widely derided: the International Monetary Fund estimates their impact as 20-30%, while a leading World Bank economist tried to conceal his estimate of a whopping 75% in a bid to avoid confrontation with the US.
The non-biotech SolutionAs Friends of The Earth pointed out “what is being lost amid the ethanol hype is a real debate about how to use energy more efficiently”. Technology and life-style choices which will reduce our energy consumption and our carbon footprint are a first step. The second step is to pour money, expertise and political will into developing a meaningful self-sufficient infrastructure of diverse, sustainable alternatives for our food and energy needs.
SOURCESOriginal material derived from GM-free Scotland News articles.
Golden distraction
In 2009, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) predicted that the first approval for a commercial release of GM 'Golden Rice' would be in the Philippines, possibly as early as 2012.
This is the final proof that Golden Rice is, and has always been, nothing more than a PR exercise to brand GM as a saviour of the Third World, and make it a Trojan Horse to get GM into the global food chain. If this conclusion seems far-fetched, have a look at the history.
Back in the days when the biotech industry was first planning to flood the world with GM food and already realised there would be opposition, its PR gurus advised it that, to engineer acceptance, it must “create positive perceptions”. Good advice, because positive perceptions distract attention from the safety issues.
Conveniently, an idea first floated in 1984 seemed to be coming to fruition 15 years later, just in time to assume the necessary positive role. The concept was a crop designed to help more than a million children who suffer blindness or death each year due to vitamin A deficiency (VAD). And so, with much fanfare, Golden Rice, genetically transformed to generate carotenoid precursors of vitamin A, was presented to the public in 2000.
To help things along, the Golden Rice Humanitarian Board was set up to provide “strategic guidance” to the project and “up-to-date and accurate information on the science, product development, and progress in regulatory approval of Golden Rice to all interested audiences”. The Board takes the position that the crop could “substantially complement (existing efforts to tackle the problem) in the future and make them more sustainable, especially in remote rural areas”. The magic rice has been supported by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, the EU Biotechnology Programme, and the wealthy Rockefeller and bill & Melinda Gates Foundations.
However, ten years on, despite the philanthropic incentives plus many years of scientific and PR endeavour, not to mention some $100 million of public money, the Golden Rice 'saviour' hasn't become a reality.
According to Golden Rice's developers and backers, the reasons for this have been the “degenerately immoral” “bunch of cranks” whose “exaggerated criticism” and “fear-mongering” have led to a burdensome and unrealistic regulatory climate. (Dr. Adrian Dubock)
Is this true, or is it crude name-calling to deflect attention away from awkward questions about the safety of the rice?
A review of the science, or more accurately the curious absence of science, in the published literature over the decade during which Golden rice has been under development might offer a clue to the answer.
The initial 'successful' genetic transformation resulted in a rice plant which generated beta-carotene (pro-vitamin A), but not by the metabolic route anticipated. The scientists seem to have shrugged and decided that the rice would do just fine even if they weren't sure why.
The first field trials found beta-carotene production was inexplicably 3-5 times higher than under laboratory conditions (another shrug).
Foodwatch Germany describes how a sample of this first generation Golden Rice was sent to a specialist laboratory for mouse feeding studies. The tests apparently never took place because the researchers discovered the rice contained less than 1% of the expected level of carotenoids.
Greenpeace's early challenge that Golden Rice didn't produce enough pro-vitamin A to benefit its consumers (an average 2-year-old would have to eat 3 kilos of the rice a day to reach the recommended intake) revealed a number of holes in the project. For example, the Humanitarian Board countered by shifting its position from a claim that Golden Rice is needed because “smallholders grow their own rice and little else”, to a claim that it was unrealistic of Greenpeace to assume children had to get all their vitamin A from rice. The rice's creators also illogically suggested that only half the recommended intake needed to prevent malnutrition may prevent malnutrition.
The problem of insufficient generation of carotenoids isn't the only fly in the GM ointment. Beta-carotene is a large molecule with a wide potential for breaking down to derivative substances, especially in the presence of sunlight and enzymes active in the rice grain; in short, it inevitably degenerates during storage. However last April, 2008, US researchers announced some good news for the Golden Rice project. Their “soon-to-be-published” studies of human volunteers indicated that the previously assumed 12 molecules of beta-carotene needed to create a single molecule of vitamin A was wrong. The conversion ratio was only 3 or 4 beta-carotenes per vitamin A. Either our previous knowledge of carotene metabolism was wanting, or possibly the US study was wishful thinking, because 14 months later it still has not been published.
If you've been counting, that's six demonstrations that our knowledge of the real-life biochemical pathways involving in beta-carotene and vitamin A is defective in important areas.
Unwilling to let go of the baby which wasn't as golden as hoped, Syngenta took over development of the rice. The DNA was re-engineered with new versions of the genes, and so Golden Rice Mark II, with 23 times the carotenoid levels of Mark I, was created.
Syngenta also took steps to 'create positive perceptions' and by-pass the influences of the degenerately-immoral cranks (and regulators?) of the developed world by 'donating' its new GM rice to research institutions across China, India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Vietnam (all places where rice is a staple, and sometimes the only, food, and where GM regulatory control is weak). The Company also worked out a deal so that farmers in developing countries earning less than $10,000 a year could get it free.
So far, so good. But as Golden Rice was being pushed altruistically towards Third World fields, what happened to the the tests for safety?
Field trials asked for by the Chinese regulators were stalled because the Rockefeller Foundation viewed them as “a foolish use of our funds”.
The Golden Rice Humanitarian Board claims that repeatedly breeding a GM plant with a local strain of rice will result in a crop “with the only difference that it is now capable of producing and accumulating beta-carotene (pro-vitamin A).” This is an unproven assumption. It's also scientifically unlikely that an artificial active gene producing a biologically active substance will fail to alter other aspects of whatever plant genome or physiology it is in.
Evidence for safety presented by the Humanitarian Board focuses on beta-carotene only, and moreover on beta-carotene from plant sources other than Golden Rice. This is disingenuous, because beta-carotene belongs to a family of some 600 related substances, at least 60 of which can be precursors to 'retinoids'. Only three retinoids have been closely studied, but all of such substances are likely to cause birth defects. Moreover, some carotenoid derivatives are known to be cumulative in blood and in fat. It's not fanciful to see the danger that unpredictable novel derivatives could emerge from a plant forced to over-produce a novel beta-carotene in grain where the substance isn't naturally present. Such questions are clearly very serious, not only because rice is so often the only food for the poor in developing countries, but because rice out-crosses very readily with weedy relatives. This means that if, or when, a toxic consequences emerges in Golden Rice, it will continue forever within a weedy reservoir in all the developing countries being targeted by the biotech industry.
In March 2009, the Golden Rice Project stated that the rice had gone through “many tests” , specifying nine. There are no animal feeding studies mentioned, but two items are relevant:
Press reports indicate that the Chinese trials which “have been conducted” on children were, in fact, abandoned when Greenpeace alerted the Chinese authorities of the GM nature of the rice being trialled. The US Clinical Trials website indicates that trials have been run there since 2004, but no data from these “highly successful” studies have been published.
More seriously, these clinical trials seem to be well and truly jumping the safety gun: there have been no data published for levels of GM pro-vitamin A, nor for animal feeding studies, nor for carotenoid-degradation in the rice during storage and cooking, nor for uniformity and stability of the crops, nor for any environmental studies. Add to this that second generation Golden Rice appears not to be one specific GM trait, but a collection of experimental transgenic events without basic molecular characterisation nor data on their biological properties. Regarding the 'tests' described above, there is no indication which of these various GM events (each with its own carotenoid production) was actually given to the human guinea-pigs (including children). If the Golden Rice is to be commercialised in the Philippines by 2012, not even a fraction of the safety-testing needed has been scheduled.
The biotech industry attitude to safety is that as “Golden Rice contains the food colours found everywhere in coloured natural foods and the environment .... There is no possible way the trials (on humans) could do any harm to the participants.” Given the scope for novel retinoids described above, and the danger these could present to future generations, such claims might appear more “degenerately immoral” than those of the “cranks” who keep sounding warnings.
Information for the public from the Humanitarian Board, which pledges to apply the highest safety standards, is that “Golden Rice will be cooked just like any other rice, from using plain water to highly refined sauces and spices, and it will always taste good.” To back this up it gives yummy (and completely irrelevant) recipes for Paella a la Valencia, Jambalaya, Thai Fried Rice and Pilaf Rice with Whole Spices, all of which we can make with yummy Golden Rice. The safety, or even the presence of artificial pro-vitamin A, just doesn't figure. Another distraction or what?
To go back to the Philippine GM effort described above as the 'proof' that Golden Rice is pure PR.
The Philippine project is based on the first generation of Golden Rice, the version discarded because it has too little pro-vitamin A to be any help to those with deficiencies. This begs the question why are the Philippine crop developers using it at all? In fact, the Humanitarian Board has dismissed criticism of its first Golden Rice by writing it off as nothing more than an initial 'proof of concept', suggesting the Philippine project is at a very early stage indeed, and should be many more than three years away from being a golden reality. On the other hand, perhaps the scientists know more about Golden Rice than they're telling: if there's very little of the novel substance present, there's less likelihood of toxic consequences and using the 'proof of concept' instead of the real thing might be a safer option. It's worth noting that the other (truly) useful qualities the Philippine Golden Rice will have, such as disease resistance and yield, are being incorporated by conventional breeding. We are left with a GM crop which will have qualities very acceptable to the farmers growing it and will have the added PR value of pretending to supply vitamin A.
COMMENT
Two other fundamental questions have not been broached above.
One is the efficacy of adding a single nutrient to a staple food. The problem arises because all nutrients interact during digestion, absorption, transport around the body, and utilisation and storage within the cells. When nutrient levels are low, these interactions can become more important, with one nutrient enhancing the use of another. In other words, for health, people need a fresh and varied diet containing a wide range of trace nutrients. What are the chances that efforts to provide more important resources for sustainable cultivation of nutrient-rich vegetables will be side-lined by Golden Rice?
Second, the Humanitarian Board tactfully describe their rice as a “complement” to existing initiatives to combat VAD. However, what are the chances the existing distribution of supplements will be side-lined by Golden Rice?
Ask your immorally-degenerate conscience very seriously: should you be promoting the highly successful status quo which distributes vitamin A supplements to specific needy children and works to provide the resources for self-sufficiency in nutrient-rich plants? Or, should you promote the abandonment of current endeavours in favour of mass-medication using a thoroughly untested, secrecy-enshrouded GM crop which might not contain enough carotenoids once it reaches them to save their children, and might at the same time produce an entire generation crippled with birth-defects?
SOURCES
Melody M. Aguiba, Fortified with vitamin A: RP may be first to okay 'golden' rice, Manila Bulletin, 15.02.09, http://www.bic.searca.org/
Leaked document on Communications Programmes for Europabio, January 1997, Reclaim The Streets
Ye et al, Engineering the Provitamin A (β-carotene) Biosynthetic Pathway into (Caroneoid-Free) Rice Endosperm, Science 287:5451 14.01.00
The Golden Rice Humanitarian Board, http://www.goldenrice.org/ April 2009
Christopher Then, The campaign for genetically modified rice is at the crossroads: A critical look at Golden Rice after nearly 10 years of development, www.scouting-biotechnology.net, http://www.foodwatch.de/ January 2009
Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Prof. Joe Cummins, The Golden Rice Scandal Unfolds, Science in Society, Issue 42, Summer 2009 and Press Release 18.03.09
Dr Mae-Wan Ho, Golden Rice and Hazards of GMOs, Lecture, 5th European Conference on 0GMO-Free Regions, Lucerne, 27.04.09
Adrian Dubock, Eco Soundings: Golden Rice bord dubs Gm-0free campaigners 'cranks', Humanitarian Board reply to GM-free Cymru, http://www.guardian.co.uk/ Guardian Environment Blog, April 2009
A critical look at Golden Rice, Food Watch Germany, 07.01.09
Naomie Bisserbe, A new genetically modified rice strain is breeding controversy, http://www.businessworld.in/ 22.08.08
Sean Poulter, British scientists condemn using children in GM food trials as unacceptable, Daily Mail 17.02.09
Vitamin A Equivalence of Plant Carotenoids in Children, trial proposal by Tufts University, http://clinicaltrials.gov/ February 2009
Martin Enserink, Tough Lessons From Golden Rice, Science 320:5875 25.04.08
Graham and Welch, Micronutrient interactions in Humans: Setting goals for plant breeders and agronomists, in Plant nutrition 2001
Holum, Organic and Biological Chemistry, John Wiley and Sons, 1969.
This is the final proof that Golden Rice is, and has always been, nothing more than a PR exercise to brand GM as a saviour of the Third World, and make it a Trojan Horse to get GM into the global food chain. If this conclusion seems far-fetched, have a look at the history.
Back in the days when the biotech industry was first planning to flood the world with GM food and already realised there would be opposition, its PR gurus advised it that, to engineer acceptance, it must “create positive perceptions”. Good advice, because positive perceptions distract attention from the safety issues.
Conveniently, an idea first floated in 1984 seemed to be coming to fruition 15 years later, just in time to assume the necessary positive role. The concept was a crop designed to help more than a million children who suffer blindness or death each year due to vitamin A deficiency (VAD). And so, with much fanfare, Golden Rice, genetically transformed to generate carotenoid precursors of vitamin A, was presented to the public in 2000.
To help things along, the Golden Rice Humanitarian Board was set up to provide “strategic guidance” to the project and “up-to-date and accurate information on the science, product development, and progress in regulatory approval of Golden Rice to all interested audiences”. The Board takes the position that the crop could “substantially complement (existing efforts to tackle the problem) in the future and make them more sustainable, especially in remote rural areas”. The magic rice has been supported by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, the EU Biotechnology Programme, and the wealthy Rockefeller and bill & Melinda Gates Foundations.
However, ten years on, despite the philanthropic incentives plus many years of scientific and PR endeavour, not to mention some $100 million of public money, the Golden Rice 'saviour' hasn't become a reality.
According to Golden Rice's developers and backers, the reasons for this have been the “degenerately immoral” “bunch of cranks” whose “exaggerated criticism” and “fear-mongering” have led to a burdensome and unrealistic regulatory climate. (Dr. Adrian Dubock)
Is this true, or is it crude name-calling to deflect attention away from awkward questions about the safety of the rice?
A review of the science, or more accurately the curious absence of science, in the published literature over the decade during which Golden rice has been under development might offer a clue to the answer.
The initial 'successful' genetic transformation resulted in a rice plant which generated beta-carotene (pro-vitamin A), but not by the metabolic route anticipated. The scientists seem to have shrugged and decided that the rice would do just fine even if they weren't sure why.
The first field trials found beta-carotene production was inexplicably 3-5 times higher than under laboratory conditions (another shrug).
Foodwatch Germany describes how a sample of this first generation Golden Rice was sent to a specialist laboratory for mouse feeding studies. The tests apparently never took place because the researchers discovered the rice contained less than 1% of the expected level of carotenoids.
Greenpeace's early challenge that Golden Rice didn't produce enough pro-vitamin A to benefit its consumers (an average 2-year-old would have to eat 3 kilos of the rice a day to reach the recommended intake) revealed a number of holes in the project. For example, the Humanitarian Board countered by shifting its position from a claim that Golden Rice is needed because “smallholders grow their own rice and little else”, to a claim that it was unrealistic of Greenpeace to assume children had to get all their vitamin A from rice. The rice's creators also illogically suggested that only half the recommended intake needed to prevent malnutrition may prevent malnutrition.
The problem of insufficient generation of carotenoids isn't the only fly in the GM ointment. Beta-carotene is a large molecule with a wide potential for breaking down to derivative substances, especially in the presence of sunlight and enzymes active in the rice grain; in short, it inevitably degenerates during storage. However last April, 2008, US researchers announced some good news for the Golden Rice project. Their “soon-to-be-published” studies of human volunteers indicated that the previously assumed 12 molecules of beta-carotene needed to create a single molecule of vitamin A was wrong. The conversion ratio was only 3 or 4 beta-carotenes per vitamin A. Either our previous knowledge of carotene metabolism was wanting, or possibly the US study was wishful thinking, because 14 months later it still has not been published.
If you've been counting, that's six demonstrations that our knowledge of the real-life biochemical pathways involving in beta-carotene and vitamin A is defective in important areas.
Unwilling to let go of the baby which wasn't as golden as hoped, Syngenta took over development of the rice. The DNA was re-engineered with new versions of the genes, and so Golden Rice Mark II, with 23 times the carotenoid levels of Mark I, was created.
Syngenta also took steps to 'create positive perceptions' and by-pass the influences of the degenerately-immoral cranks (and regulators?) of the developed world by 'donating' its new GM rice to research institutions across China, India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Vietnam (all places where rice is a staple, and sometimes the only, food, and where GM regulatory control is weak). The Company also worked out a deal so that farmers in developing countries earning less than $10,000 a year could get it free.
So far, so good. But as Golden Rice was being pushed altruistically towards Third World fields, what happened to the the tests for safety?
Field trials asked for by the Chinese regulators were stalled because the Rockefeller Foundation viewed them as “a foolish use of our funds”.
The Golden Rice Humanitarian Board claims that repeatedly breeding a GM plant with a local strain of rice will result in a crop “with the only difference that it is now capable of producing and accumulating beta-carotene (pro-vitamin A).” This is an unproven assumption. It's also scientifically unlikely that an artificial active gene producing a biologically active substance will fail to alter other aspects of whatever plant genome or physiology it is in.
Evidence for safety presented by the Humanitarian Board focuses on beta-carotene only, and moreover on beta-carotene from plant sources other than Golden Rice. This is disingenuous, because beta-carotene belongs to a family of some 600 related substances, at least 60 of which can be precursors to 'retinoids'. Only three retinoids have been closely studied, but all of such substances are likely to cause birth defects. Moreover, some carotenoid derivatives are known to be cumulative in blood and in fat. It's not fanciful to see the danger that unpredictable novel derivatives could emerge from a plant forced to over-produce a novel beta-carotene in grain where the substance isn't naturally present. Such questions are clearly very serious, not only because rice is so often the only food for the poor in developing countries, but because rice out-crosses very readily with weedy relatives. This means that if, or when, a toxic consequences emerges in Golden Rice, it will continue forever within a weedy reservoir in all the developing countries being targeted by the biotech industry.
In March 2009, the Golden Rice Project stated that the rice had gone through “many tests” , specifying nine. There are no animal feeding studies mentioned, but two items are relevant:
- “8. Tests for beta-carotene bioavailability and bioconversion to retinol ... with deuterium-labelled Golden Rice fed to adults in USA and a small group of children in China have been conducted. The former were highly successful and the latter are being evaluated at present.”
- “9. Feeding trials with human adults in China were carried out to measure the effect of fate in the diet, on bioconversion and bioavailability.”
Note. The other seven tests listed by the Golden Rice Project relate to:
- a biochemical explanation of the golden colour of the rice grains
- the fact that 10 out of 2000 GM events were selected for further development
- gene expression profiling
- allergenic potential
- artificial digestibility
- the smallness of the quantity of carbon used by the plant for GM purposes
- and taste trials.
Press reports indicate that the Chinese trials which “have been conducted” on children were, in fact, abandoned when Greenpeace alerted the Chinese authorities of the GM nature of the rice being trialled. The US Clinical Trials website indicates that trials have been run there since 2004, but no data from these “highly successful” studies have been published.
More seriously, these clinical trials seem to be well and truly jumping the safety gun: there have been no data published for levels of GM pro-vitamin A, nor for animal feeding studies, nor for carotenoid-degradation in the rice during storage and cooking, nor for uniformity and stability of the crops, nor for any environmental studies. Add to this that second generation Golden Rice appears not to be one specific GM trait, but a collection of experimental transgenic events without basic molecular characterisation nor data on their biological properties. Regarding the 'tests' described above, there is no indication which of these various GM events (each with its own carotenoid production) was actually given to the human guinea-pigs (including children). If the Golden Rice is to be commercialised in the Philippines by 2012, not even a fraction of the safety-testing needed has been scheduled.
The biotech industry attitude to safety is that as “Golden Rice contains the food colours found everywhere in coloured natural foods and the environment .... There is no possible way the trials (on humans) could do any harm to the participants.” Given the scope for novel retinoids described above, and the danger these could present to future generations, such claims might appear more “degenerately immoral” than those of the “cranks” who keep sounding warnings.
Information for the public from the Humanitarian Board, which pledges to apply the highest safety standards, is that “Golden Rice will be cooked just like any other rice, from using plain water to highly refined sauces and spices, and it will always taste good.” To back this up it gives yummy (and completely irrelevant) recipes for Paella a la Valencia, Jambalaya, Thai Fried Rice and Pilaf Rice with Whole Spices, all of which we can make with yummy Golden Rice. The safety, or even the presence of artificial pro-vitamin A, just doesn't figure. Another distraction or what?
To go back to the Philippine GM effort described above as the 'proof' that Golden Rice is pure PR.
The Philippine project is based on the first generation of Golden Rice, the version discarded because it has too little pro-vitamin A to be any help to those with deficiencies. This begs the question why are the Philippine crop developers using it at all? In fact, the Humanitarian Board has dismissed criticism of its first Golden Rice by writing it off as nothing more than an initial 'proof of concept', suggesting the Philippine project is at a very early stage indeed, and should be many more than three years away from being a golden reality. On the other hand, perhaps the scientists know more about Golden Rice than they're telling: if there's very little of the novel substance present, there's less likelihood of toxic consequences and using the 'proof of concept' instead of the real thing might be a safer option. It's worth noting that the other (truly) useful qualities the Philippine Golden Rice will have, such as disease resistance and yield, are being incorporated by conventional breeding. We are left with a GM crop which will have qualities very acceptable to the farmers growing it and will have the added PR value of pretending to supply vitamin A.
COMMENT
Two other fundamental questions have not been broached above.
One is the efficacy of adding a single nutrient to a staple food. The problem arises because all nutrients interact during digestion, absorption, transport around the body, and utilisation and storage within the cells. When nutrient levels are low, these interactions can become more important, with one nutrient enhancing the use of another. In other words, for health, people need a fresh and varied diet containing a wide range of trace nutrients. What are the chances that efforts to provide more important resources for sustainable cultivation of nutrient-rich vegetables will be side-lined by Golden Rice?
Second, the Humanitarian Board tactfully describe their rice as a “complement” to existing initiatives to combat VAD. However, what are the chances the existing distribution of supplements will be side-lined by Golden Rice?
Ask your immorally-degenerate conscience very seriously: should you be promoting the highly successful status quo which distributes vitamin A supplements to specific needy children and works to provide the resources for self-sufficiency in nutrient-rich plants? Or, should you promote the abandonment of current endeavours in favour of mass-medication using a thoroughly untested, secrecy-enshrouded GM crop which might not contain enough carotenoids once it reaches them to save their children, and might at the same time produce an entire generation crippled with birth-defects?
SOURCES
Melody M. Aguiba, Fortified with vitamin A: RP may be first to okay 'golden' rice, Manila Bulletin, 15.02.09, http://www.bic.searca.org/
Leaked document on Communications Programmes for Europabio, January 1997, Reclaim The Streets
Ye et al, Engineering the Provitamin A (β-carotene) Biosynthetic Pathway into (Caroneoid-Free) Rice Endosperm, Science 287:5451 14.01.00
The Golden Rice Humanitarian Board, http://www.goldenrice.org/ April 2009
Christopher Then, The campaign for genetically modified rice is at the crossroads: A critical look at Golden Rice after nearly 10 years of development, www.scouting-biotechnology.net, http://www.foodwatch.de/ January 2009
Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Prof. Joe Cummins, The Golden Rice Scandal Unfolds, Science in Society, Issue 42, Summer 2009 and Press Release 18.03.09
Dr Mae-Wan Ho, Golden Rice and Hazards of GMOs, Lecture, 5th European Conference on 0GMO-Free Regions, Lucerne, 27.04.09
Adrian Dubock, Eco Soundings: Golden Rice bord dubs Gm-0free campaigners 'cranks', Humanitarian Board reply to GM-free Cymru, http://www.guardian.co.uk/ Guardian Environment Blog, April 2009
A critical look at Golden Rice, Food Watch Germany, 07.01.09
Naomie Bisserbe, A new genetically modified rice strain is breeding controversy, http://www.businessworld.in/ 22.08.08
Sean Poulter, British scientists condemn using children in GM food trials as unacceptable, Daily Mail 17.02.09
Vitamin A Equivalence of Plant Carotenoids in Children, trial proposal by Tufts University, http://clinicaltrials.gov/ February 2009
Martin Enserink, Tough Lessons From Golden Rice, Science 320:5875 25.04.08
Graham and Welch, Micronutrient interactions in Humans: Setting goals for plant breeders and agronomists, in Plant nutrition 2001
Holum, Organic and Biological Chemistry, John Wiley and Sons, 1969.
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