Image credit: Greenpeace

A blogger recently commented on a post from March, and while I replied to the comment, I don’t think that enough people are going catch my response. To bring this discussion forward, I will respond to Karl from Inoculated Mind here.

Karl: “The sugar that results from the GE sugar beets is identical to the sugar from non-GE beets. You’re giving yourself unnecessary food-fear hurdles.

Do you think that mixing DNA from different species is unnatural? Would it interest you to learn that Sugar Cane is a mixture of two different grass species, a polyploid? A whole host of other crops that we eat are polyploid, and have had their genetics modified drastically.”

Nigel: You have raised the most common misconceptions from the pro-GE community, which makes my response easy. First of all, it is impossible that sugar from GE beets would be identical to sugar from non-GE beets. if that were the case, one would not be able to design a test that would identify GE sugar. GE crops have novel DNA, and novel proteins. No tests are done to identify all of the novel proteins, and adding these types of proteins into people’s diets could cause serious issues if they turn out to be allergic.
Second of all, conventional breeding and even hybrid breeding combine genetic material from plants that are in the same family or at least the same species. Genetic engineering can introduce genetic material from plants/animals/microbes/fungi that are in a different kingdom. It has been demonstrated that a genetic code will produce a different protein if it is in bacteria or in a plant, yet test are not done to determine the effects of this new protein on humans, or even animals. The genes that have been introduced into sugar beets are taken from the only bacteria able to survive in the tailings of a Monsanto herbicide factory.
Finally, it should not be for you to say that I should eat genetically engineered food. That should be my decision. Smoking was not considered unhealthy in the thirties and fourties, but people still had the choice as to whether they would smoke. We now know that smoking is carcinogenic. Furthermore, we now know that second-hand smoke is carcinogenic, so even non-smokers can get smoking related diseases. There is no conclusive evidence that genetically engineered foods are carcinogenic, yet there is also no conclusive evidence that genetically engineered foods are not carcinogenic. I would rather not take the chance. If we find out thirty years from now that GMOs are cancer-causing, I think everyone would rather have stayed away from them.

I always welcome comments from the pro-GE and the anti-GE communities. Please feel free to post a response.

Further reading:

Genetically Engineered Food May Cause Rising Food Allergies

50 Harmful Effects of Genetically Engineered Food

Hazards of Genetically Engineered Food: Why We Need a Global Moratorium

Image credit: Flyzipper on Flickr

While it is great news that Nelson has been declared a GE-Free Zone, it does not mean we are winning the fight against genetically engineered foods. A renewed effort has begun pushing for the widespread cultivation of genetically engineered wheat. I will deal with this issue in three parts. Today I will discuss why GE wheat is such a dangerous technology to be dealing with.

I will not go into great depth, because it has been covered in detail by people who know more than I do, so I will merely summarize. First off, there are the concerns we have with all GE crops. These include contamination and cross polination. For example, GE rice has never been approved for commercial cultivation, yet Greenpeace tested rice in Vancouver supermarkets, and found a bag of illegal GE rice just one kilometer from my house. They calculated that contamination from GE rice test fields has cost $1.285 Billion (USD). Within two years of GE canola being released, super-weeds were found that were resistant to three different brands of herbicide, because three different strains had interbred. Now non-GE canola is extremely rare. Wheat is self-pollinating, and can cross with a number of other grass species. There is a legitimate cause for concern that once released, we will never be able to go back to a world where non-genetically engineered wheat is readily available.

Next we have to consider the Canadian economy. Wheat exports are a vital part of our farm economy, and our major export markets have declared that they will not import any wheat if we approve GE wheat. One estimate puts losses for Canadian farmers at $185 million per year (Michelle Lang. “Price of Growing GM Wheat Too High: Farmers Would Lose Millions.” The Star Phoenix (Saskatoon). 26 February 2002).

Finally we have to consider the dangers to human health. While the major GE crops that are widely cultivated today, soy, corn and canola, are mostly used for animal feed, wheat is almost exclusively used for human food. I am not trying to say that feeding animals non-GE food is not important, because it is. There have been many documented cases where animals refuse to eat GE feed, and it has been found that novel proteins and DNA material works its way up the food chain. However, we eat most wheat with very little processing. grind it up, throw in some yeast and water, bake, and eat.

Sierra Club - GE Wheat

Organic Consumers Association - GE Wheat - includes links to several other great sites

Next week I will discuss the groundwork that has been done to prevent GE wheat, which Monsanto applied to have approved in 2001.

Great news for everyone involved in the anti-genetically engineered food movement: Nelson, BC has passed a resolution at council declaring the city to be a GE-Free Zone. Nelson now joins Saltspring Island and Powell River as a place where genetically engineered crops cannot be grown. I am very proud to have worked on this campaign, and that my company, GE-Free Solutions, played a small part in sponsoring Percy Schmeiser to speak in Castlegar, a neighbouring city. As the Kootenay region liaison for Society for a GE-Free BC, I had the opportunity to meet many of the principle individuals who made this happen. I believe that this would not have happened without the two-year long efforts of Jon Steinman, the host of the radio show Deconstructing Dinner on Kootenay Co-op Radio, among so many others who dedicated their time to this cause.

Congratulation to everyone who was involved in this effort, and let this be a shining example of the power of the grass-roots to bring about positive change.

Its here. GE crops were not enough, the FDA has now opened the door for GE animals and fish. They have announced that they will begin accepting applications for commercialization of GE animals and fish. Please read the story at Food Democracy, especially the FAQ published by the FDA. It is incredibly disturbing.

This new regulatory process brings up a number of serious concerns.

• No labels will be required, so unless we buy organic or “non-GE”, we will end up eating GE meat. So basically, don’t eat at fast food anymore, or you will be eating some featherless chickens
• The major market for GE animals is for “biopharm” animals. Basically genetically engineered animal factories producing pharmaceuticals.
• Renderings from biopharm animals can be fed to other animals.
• Offspring of GE animals which are not considered to have inherited the GE trait, are not considered GE. This means that if a GE featherless chicken has a feathered offspring, it could be considered non-GE… and possibly organic? Hopefully organic regulations will keep up.
• I think the FDA’s approach to containment speaks for itself: “It also would be extremely unlikely for any GE animal to accidentally displace conventional animals. Most developers of the GE animals will likely control their breeding opportunities to further their business interests.” Free market environmental protection? Free market biodiversity protection? Free market bioethics?

The FDA is known to be controlled by the industry. They are acting in the interest of business profits at the expense of our environment, biodiversity, and human health and safety. Can you Americans ask Mr. Obama to overhaul the FDA, and the regulation of GE foods? I certainly hope the CFIA doesn’t follow suit, as the did with GE crops.

Will asked me to answer a question on his blog. The question was “is organic soymilk guaranteed free of genetically modified soybeans?”

My answer

The Biotechnology Industry Organization Pacific Rim Summit on Biotechnology and Biofuels wrapped up on Friday. I would like to conclude my coverage of this conference by giving out a few undoGE awards for the best and the worst of what I saw.
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From left to right: Michael Doane, Monsanto; Maria Wellisch, Natural Resources Canada; McKenna Long and Alderidge rep; Terry McIntyre, Environment Canada. Photo Credit, Nigel Tunnacliffe.

The final session of the conference, called “Sustainable Development of Bioenergy and Biofuels Production Systems”, was the most representative of the relationship between industry and our government when it comes to biotechnology and biofuels. (more…)

Today’s plenary lunch session was the most interesting of the sessions so far. Dr. Drew Endy, Assistant Professor at the Bioengeneering department at Stanford and the President of the BioBricks Foundation (a registry for DNA code), spoke about synthetic biology. His vision for the technology (which is well underway, by the way) is that there will be a large registry, sort of like iTunes, where one can download DNA sequences. Using an assembler, they can produce the DNA, and essentially write a computer program (organic machine) using DNA. Apparently, they have already mapped the DNA for all boolean algebra.

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I heard a new term today in a discussion with a genetic engineer at my lunch table. “Cisgenic” is the introduction of a trait from the same species into its DNA. They use a different term because one of the criticisms of genetic engineering is that traits are introduced from organisms in a different kingdom, which makes some people uncomfortable. This new distinction, some industry players hope, will reduce public opposition to genetic engineering. Too bad cisgenic organisms still carry almost all the same risks. As Jefferey Smith pointed out, there is a ripple effect in the DNA of the host organism when a trait is inserted which effects the entire genome. Unrelated genes can mutate, make extra copies of themselves, change their levels of expression, and/or randomly turn on or off.

When I posed this to the man I was speaking to, he said that it is simply not economically feasable to see what other impact the insertion might have on the genome. In fact, for good measure, they will put in multiple copies of the trait they want to see expressed, because they have no idea how to ensure it works. Essentially, we just don’t know enough about genetic engineering to be playing around with gene insertions at this point.

When I posed that point, he agreed, but said that there is a cost-benefit analysis as to whether it is worth it because we can grow fuel instead of sucking it out of the ground. Too bad the people who accept the risk are not the people who receive the benefit.