***********************************************
WORLDWIDE
FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS
Biotechnology
& Genetic Engineering: The Debate Heats Up
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Forest
Networking a Project of Ecological Enterprises
May 28,
1995
OVERVIEW
& SOURCE
Following
is an excellent article, written for Z magazine, on the
potential
consequences of Biotechnology and genetic engineering.
It is
by Brian Tokar, author of "The
Green Alternative" and the
forthcoming "Renewing the Environmental
Revolution." The article
does
a wonderful job of relating the history
of research into
biotechnological
manipulation of foods. Substantially,
the
article
relates biotechnology to international concerns for
ecology
and biodiversity. He terms
biotechnology the "most
ambitious
and imperialistic of technologies."
At the end there is
a good
list of additional sources for information.
This was
posted
in econet's nfn.tempforest conference.
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RELAYED
TEXT STARTS HERE:
/**
nfn.tempforest: 325.0 **/
**
Topic: Biotechnology articles (1 of 2) **
**
Written 9:32 AM May 12, 1995 by briant@sun.goddard.edu
in
cdp:nfn.tempforest
**
From:
briant@sun.goddard.edu (Brian Tokar)
Dear
friends,
Below
you will find the text of 2 articles I just completed that
are
partly based on information I gathered at the Third World
Network's
seminar on biotechnology at the U.N. in April.
Please
feel
free to reprint, excerpt or distribute either or both of
these
articles, with attribution to the original publications.
I look
forward to your comments.
Love to
all, Brian
-------------------------
For Z
Magazine, June 1995
Biotechnology: The Debate Heats Up --Brian Tokar
For many years, public debates around
biotechnology and
genetic
engineering were mostly the domain of scientists, ex-
scientists
and anti-scientists. Now, those days
are clearly past,
as
products of biotechnology have begun to transform the nature of
our
food, our medicines and global capitalism's relationship to
the
natural world (see Z July/August 1989 and February 1992). But
as
environmentalists, consumer groups and others struggle to come
to
terms with the complex issues surrounding biotechnology, a new
generation
of scientist-activists is proposing a much more
sweeping
critique of this most ambitious and imperialistic of
technologies.
The debate over genetically engineered
Bovine Growth
Hormone
(BGH) for dairy cows has spread from the key dairy states
to
urban centers throughout the U.S.
Tomatoes engineered to last
three
weeks on supermarket shelves are being test-marketed around
the
country, and genetically altered varieties of squash,
potatoes,
soybeans, cotton and canola oil are winding their way
through
the triad of USDA, FDA and EPA approval.
Biotech
companies
pledge sure cures for anemia, cystic fibrosis and
possibly
cancer -- as long as patients are prepared to pay upward
of
$1000 per dose -- and recent developments in the international
Human
Genome Initiative advance the promise of diagnostic tests
(if not
"cures") for a wide range of genetic diseases. Heretofore
unconceivable
manipulations of the genetic makeup of bacteria,
plants,
animals and people are promoted as lying just around the
corner.
For environmentalists, food safety
advocates, medical
ethicists
and others concerned about the consequences of the new
genetic
technologies, these developments raise a serious dilemma.
Never
before have the results of new scientific discoveries been
so
heavily promoted and so rapidly rushed to market. Never before
has the
course of basic scientific research been so thoroughly and
singlemindedly
driven by commercial considerations.
Each new
product
contains profound implications for the integrity of
natural
ecosystems, the humane rearing of domestic animals, the
safety
and quality of the food supply, the virulence of common
plant
and insect pests, the survival of small farms, the nature of
medical
care, and the ethics of genetic experimentation itself.
But
with hundreds of agricultural products and scores of new drugs
being
developed and tested in the U.S. alone, it is difficult to
imagine
how activists, or government regulators (if they were
to be
so inclined), could respond individually to every new
product
and every new discovery.
In the early years of the so-called
"genetic revolution,"
it was
the scientists themselves that first raised the alarm. In
1975,
shortly after researchers at Stanford University succeeded
in
transfering a gene for antibiotic resistance from one species
of
bacteria to another, molecular biologists raised a call for
federal
guidelines to contain potentially hazardous experiments.
Contrary
to their expectations, widespread opposition emerged in
cities
such as Cambridge and Palo Alto where the necessary
containment
laboratories for genetic experimentation were to be
built. Guidelines were established by the National
Institutes
of Health
(NIH) and, despite a substantial record of abuses and
minor
scandals, they were progressively weakened in the years that
followed. Gene-splicing soon became the technology of
choice in
an
ever-widening range of research specialties.
By the mid-
eighties,
opposition among mainstream scientists to the growing
commercialization
of genetic research had also all but evaporated.
Last summer, a new generation of
scientific skeptics
gathered,
this time in Malaysia, under the auspices of the
internationally
renowned Third World Network.
Specialists in
areas
ranging from molecular genetics to plant ecology, biophysics
and
medicine drafted a new statement, "The Need for Greater
Regulation
and Control of Genetic Engineering," which should
help to
substantially raise the current level of debate around
biotechnology. This past April, many of these scientists
gathered
in New
York City to inform delegates to the United Nations
Commission
on Sustainable Development of their findings, and to
press
for an international protocol on biosafety to be amended to
the
Biodiversity Convention adopted at the U.N. environmental
summit
in 1992.
The role of the Third World Network in
this debate is
especially
noteworthy. For many third world
activists, the new
genetic
technologies represent a profound threat to their native
ecosystems
and the lives of traditional agriculturalists.
Northern
drug and chemical companies have been actively "mining"
tropical
ecosystems and their communities of indigenous people for
exotic
medicinal plants, highly resilient relatives of common food
crops
and other treasures. Hiding behind the
protections of
the new
GATT agreement's Intellectual Property Rights provisions,
companies
are able to patent their "discoveries," and turn them
into
proprietary products for worldwide commercial sale.
Meanwhile, international development
agencies have been
actively
promoting the idea of a second "green revolution" based
on
biotechnology. Many in the so-called
"developing world"
believe
this would land an even more decisive blow to traditional
agriculture
and food self-reliance than the original "green
revolution"
of the 1970s, which was based on specialized hybrid
varieties
of common grain crops that proved highly dependent on
expensive
chemical inputs. Indian farmers have
organized against
the
increasing commercialization of agriculture, and gained
worldwide
attention (except in the U.S.) in October of 1993 when
500,000
farmers gathered in Bangalore to protest corporate control
and
patenting of seeds. While activists in
the U.S. oppose
individual
products of biotechnology on a rather piecemeal basis,
third
world activists (and many in Europe, too) are expressing the
need
for a more fundamental critique and a more determined
opposition
to genetic engineering and the myths of "intellectual
property."
BGH: The Limits of Food Politics-as-Usual
Since the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) approved
genetically
engineered Bovine Growth Hormone for commercial use at
the end
of 1993, activists have been divided about how to keep the
milk
supply free of this harmful and unneeded drug.
The case
against
BGH is increasingly clear (for more details, see Z,
February
1992): numerous studies have confirmed
outbreaks of
mastitis
(udder infections) and high somatic cell counts in milk
(from
dispersed pus cells, leading to faster spoilage) after cows
are
injected with synthetic BGH. Infections
are persistent and
often
require unusually high doses of non-standard antibiotics.
BGH use
is already declining in the Western states due to
"excessive
feet and leg problems, increase in abortions, . . .
calving
difficulties, breeding problems and higher cull rates,"
according
to the industry newsletter Dairy Profit Weekly. BGH-
injected
cows are clearly draining their own metabolic reserves to
maintain
artificially elevated levels of milk production, and
consumers
have good reason to be worried about antibiotic
residues,
faster spoilage, altered levels of fat, calcium and
protein,
and various side effects from elevated levels of a BGH-
related
growth factor (IGF-1) that cows and people happen to share
in
common.
With milk prices to farmers constantly
edging downward
(and no
corresponding drop in retail prices), it is clear that
only
the chemical, drug and biotechnology industries are
benefiting
from the use of BGH. Still, the
Monsanto corporation
is
pulling out all the stops in order to make BGH milk the
industry
standard. They are selling the drug
direct to farmers,
paying
their veterinary bills, offering free disposal of syringes
and
steep discounts for increased use, and threatening to sue
companies
that label their products as free of the synthetic
hormone. It has been exceedingly difficult for people
who want to
buy
untainted milk to find out for certain which dairy companies
are
actually prohibiting farmers from using the hormone. The
reason: Monsanto and the rest of the agrichemical
industry has
decided
that biotechnology is the future and that BGH will be its
entree
into the marketplace, whether people willingly accept it or
not.
As the New York Times reported in its
business pages last
March,
"the consensus is that if a deep-pocketed giant like
Monsanto
cannot make a go of it, Wall Street will shy away from
investments
in food-industry biotechnology for years to come."
Overall,
the value of biotech stocks has fallen by half since
1992,
and the success rate for new biotech drugs -- until recently
the
industry's highest profile product -- has dropped
precipitously. Recent studies have revealed that biotech
drugs
pass
clinical trials and other tests of safety and efficacy at
about
the same rate as drugs discovered by more conventional
methods,
confirming the view that the much-touted "successes" of
biotechnology
stem largely from the industry's success in crowding
other
technologies out of the research agenda.
Early efforts to raise public
awareness of the hazards of
BGH
focused largely on media and legislative approaches. The
Washington,
D.C. (now Minnesota) based Pure Food Campaign
coordinated
demonstrations in major cities across the country in
response
to the FDA's approval of BGH, including numerous high-
profile
public milk-dumpings. Media coverage
was impressive in
the
first months of BGH use, and the coverage was often unusually
sympathetic. The Vermont legislature passed the first
mandatory
labeling
bill for BGH-tainted dairy products in March of 1994, and
Maine,
Wisconsin and Minnesota followed suit with considerably
milder
versions. Over 100 school districts
from Chicago to Los
Angeles
passed resolutions against BGH products in their
cafeterias,
and lawsuits were filed against the FDA for blatant
conflicts
of interest among the staff responsible for BGH
approval.
While all these actions have
undoubtedly tarnished the
reputation
of BGH and affected sales of dairy products nationwide,
the
dairy industry as a whole has followed in lockstep behind
Monsanto's
single-minded promotion of its new flagship product.
Over a
year after the passage of the Vermont labeling law, it has
still not
begun to be enforced. Ten months of
rule-making, a
governor
trying to play both sides, persistent legislative
attempts
to weaken the law and, finally, a lawsuit by leading
trade
associations (International Dairy Foods Association,
grocers,
food processors, etc.) have turned BGH labeling into a
political
football few in the State House are willing to be caught
with. Why is the industry so vehemently opposed to
labeling? It
is
because countless surveys in Vermont and around the country
have
shown that most people simply do not want to consume dairy
products
from cows treated with BGH.
Instead of going on the offensive
against this blatant
attempt
to prevent BGH labeling, lobbyists and lawyers for Vermont
farm
and consumer groups sought compromise.
Lacking confidence
that
the industry lawsuit could be beaten in the courts, they
quietly
supported plans to modify the labeling rules and make them
less
costly to the corporations. A few activists
took the
initiative
to approach their local schoolboards and won
resolutions
against BGH at the local level.
Meanwhile, Food &
Water,
a national food safety group based in Vermont, opted for a
more
focused campaign targeting specific corporations for
promoting
the use of BGH.
The plan was to focus on Land O'Lakes,
one of the largest
dairy
processors in the U.S., and one of the most visible
supporters
of BGH use. Food & Water had won a
small concession
from
Land O'Lakes in an earlier campaign, when the company began
marketing
a premium brand of milk in the Midwest that is free of
the
hormone. Days before the Vermont Land
O'Lakes campaign was to
begin,
Food & Water was leaked an internal memo from Vermont's
best
known cheese producer discussing plans to end their own ban
on
BGH. After hundreds of phone calls from
angry customers and
over $1
million in lost sales, the Cabot Creamery first dug in
their
heels in defense of their new policy, then began to back
off. The final outcome was not yet clear at press
time.
Organizers
are hopeful that the lessons of successful Cabot and
Land
O'Lakes campaigns can be brought to bear against the larger
national
brands that have dug in behind Monsanto.
Focused
consumer
campaigns like Food & Water's might succeed where
conventional
legislative politics has failed. (A
federal BGH-
labeling
bill, sponsored by Vermont's independent congressman,
Bernie
Sanders, is seen as having little chance of being brought
to the
House floor. Still, several national
organzations have
made
this bill the focus of their national strategy against BGH.)
It remains to be seen whether this
effort, combined with
growing
resistance to BGH by farmers, will succeed in halting the
use of
this genetically engineered drug in the U.S.
It is even
less
clear whether the same level of mobilization can be brought
to bear
against engineered tomatoes and squash later this year,
potatoes
and herbicide-resistant cotton next year, and on into the
Brave
New World of genetically engineered foods.
It would take
unprecedented
cooperation on the part of activists, a difficult
order
in this period of immobilizing cautiousness and heightened
competition
for scarce foundation funds among mainstream
organizations. In Europe, where opposition to genetic
engineering
is more
widespread, and is expressed at a more fundamental ethical
level,
the continent's agriculture ministers have agreed to extend
the
European Union's moratorium on BGH to the year 2000. In
Germany,
where the ugly face of eugenics is still strongly
imprinted
in the public consciousness, activists have organized
large
encampments on experimental plots where engineered crops are
being
tested, trampling the crops in full public view.
A New
Scientific Opposition
While people in the U.S. are fighting
important but often
piecemeal
battles against the hazards of specific products of
biotechnology,
international activists have joined with
progressive
scientists to articulate a wider critique of
biotechnology
and genetic engineering. Their focus is
on the
ecological,
social and ethical consequences of genetic
experimentation
for commercial purposes. They view the
scientific
paradigm
of genetic engineering as a fundamental misreading of the
nature
of life processes, and have demonstrated how the false
public
optimism of the biotechnology industry reflects a willing
ignorance
of recent discoveries in molecular genetics and
ecological
science. The race to commercialize
products of
biotechnology
has pushed studies of the effects of genetically
engineered
organisms (GEO's) off the agenda of mainstream science,
thus an
international moratorium on open-air releases of
engineered
life forms needs to be enforced until meaningful safety
measures
can be put in place. This, in a
nutshell, was the
message
of the Third World Network's presentation in New York this
past
April.
The widest philosophical and
historical critique of
biotechnology
was offered by Indian physicist and ecofeminist
activist
and author Vandana Shiva, who pointed out in New York
that
the mechanistic assumptions inherent in the very concept of
"genetic
engineering" reduce the complexity and self-organizing
ability
of living ecosystems to a belief that life can be
"[re]designed
from the outside." "The
reductionist paradigm
merged
in a era in which species were treated merely as objects of
'Man's
empire' to be manipulated at will for serving the interests
of the
dominant members of the human species," Shiva has written.
The
dominant view not only ignores the uncertainties inherent in
genetic
experimentation and the overwhelming proportion of
instances
in which genetically altered organisms do not behave as
predicted,
but it systematically denegrates more traditional
forms
of knowledge, upon which would-be genetic engineers
increasingly
depend for clues about where to look in nature for
promising
genes to study. "A
post-reductionist paradigm is needed
to
create respect for indigenous systems and to protect them,"
Shiva
has argued.
The limitations of the idea of genetic
engineering is best
illustrated
by a fact never mentioned in the glowing journalistic
accounts
of the latest scientific breakthroughs:
that the actual
"success"
rate of gene-splicing experiments is often very low.
Vandana
Shiva pointed out recent experiments in which one out of
550
"engineered" sheep eggs grew into sheep that produced usable
quantities
of a pharmacologically active human blood protein in
its
milk. Petunias altered to make extra
pigment often came out
white
or irregularly colored. Efforts in Nova
Scotia to insert
cold-resistance
genes from flounder into Atlantic salmon eggs were
successful
in one out of 100,000 tries. Pigs
engineered to
produce
extra growth hormone, presumably for leaner meat, were
born
deformed, sterile, and with leg muscles so weak they were
never
able to walk normally. With virtually
no effort to
systematically
study these frequent "failures," attempts to
predict
the effects of releases of engineered organisms into the
wild
are little more than guess work.
The world view that has promoted
confidence in "genetic
engineering"
despite the cascade of contradictory evidence is also
inconsistent
with discoveries in molecular genetics over the past
20
years. Popular discussions of
biotechnology, according to Mae-
Wan Ho
of the Open University of the U.K., simply ignore the
overwhelming
fact that "no gene ever functions in isolation." The
"central
dogmas" of 1960s genetics -- that genes determine visible
characteristics
in a straightforward manner (DNA -> RNA ->
proteins),
that genes are stable and passed on unchanged to future
generations
except for exceptionally rare mutations, and that
inheritance
of traits is not influenced by environmental factors -
- have
all been called into question by recent findings. The myth
of a
straightforward "genetic program" has been challenged by
discoveries
of "jumping genes," transposons, complex processing
and
"editing" of messenger RNA before it is "translated,"
the
phenomenon
of "cosuppression" (in which additional, artificially
inserted
copies of a gene suppress, rather than heighten, the
original
gene's expression), and new evidence that changes in
environment
can indeed affect the genes that bacteria and plants
pass on
to their progeny (See, for example, Scientific American,
March
1993). "Genes are defined by
context; if you don't
understand
the context, you don't understand the function of a
gene,"
added Ho's colleague, Brian Goodwin, author of the recent
book
How the Leopard Changed its Spots.
In the case of human disease, less
than 2 percent of
diseases
are now believed to be the product of a single gene.
Even in
these cases, genetic diagnosis is rarely sufficient to
predict
whether a person will ever show any symptoms.
For
example,
one in ten African American babies in the U.S. is born
with at
least one copy of the well-known sickle cell gene,
whereas
only one in 500 actually has sickle cell anemia. Some of
these
people become seriously ill as young children, while others
are
affected much later and to a far less serious degree, all for
entirely
unknown reasons. According to Berkeley
molecular
biologist
Richard Strohmann, ". . . it is becoming clear that
genetic
analysis in itself will not serve to predict, diagnose or
treat
diseases like polygenic [multi-gene] cancer, hypertension,
or
other complex human phenotypes."
The limits of genetic analysis of
disease is demonstrated
by
clear evidence that "migration of human populations results in
new
patterns of cancer in which the group takes on diseases
reflective
of their new environment, and abandons diseases common
to
their relatives who remain at home and with whom there is
shared
genetic background," acording to Strohmann. Here again,
traditional
assumptions that genetic "programs" determine
someone's
physiological character and that genetic traits are
unaffected
by environmental factors, are being seriously called
into
question.
Transgenic
Organisms and Biosafety
Industry efforts to assuage widespread
public concerns
about
biotechnology are usually based on three commonly held
myths: that genetic manipulation is
"natural," that it is not
much
different from conventional breeding, and that transgenic
organisms
are inherently unable to escape from carefully
controlled
environments, whether they be laboratories or farm
plots. Such claims have been long since discredited
in scientific
circles. Whereas conventional breeding -- and most
gene transfers
in
nature -- result in substitutions of alternate forms (alleles)
of a
particular gene in its appropriate (chromosomal or
extrachromosomal)
location, the splicing of genes in the
laboratory
can result in entirely new combinations of genetic
traits
in a single organism.
This adds tremendous new
uncertainties. According to
ecologist
Philip Regal of the University of Minnesota, even those
who
support deregulation of biotechnology now generally agree that
"there
can be no generic arguments for the safety of genetically
engineered
organisms." By creating
"populations of organisms with
novel
combinations of adaptive traits," Regal has written (i.e.,
traits
such as disease and pest resistance that improve the
chances
of survival), "genetic engineering does have the potential
to
create types of organisms that can interact with particular
ecosystems
and biological communities in novel competitive or
functional
ways . . ."
This view is supported by studies of
the effects of exotic
non-engineered
organisms that people have introduced into
environments
to which they are not adapted. In light
of nearly 40
years
of ecological studies of the impacts of plants and animals
introduced
into new environments, the likelihood of significant
ecological
damage from releases of "engineered" organisms is a
matter
of very serious concern.
From the blight that virtually destroyed
the American
chestnut
to gypsy moths, California's garden snails and
"medflies,"
kudzu vines in the southeast and roughly 40 percent of
all the
major insect pests in the U.S., organisms introduced from
faraway
places often have dramatic and unexpected effects on
native
ecosystems. Eucalyptus trees imported
from Australia
have
suffocated wetlands in North America and southeast Asia, and
have
become a significant threat to the surface water supply of
the
Florida Everglades and many other endangered ecosystems around
the
world. A study commissioned by the
United Nations Environment
Program
has documented scores of such cases, from disease-causing
microbes
that survive heavy quarantine to imported varieties of
horses,
goats and reindeer. "The results
of this wholesale
scrambling
of the earth's fauna and flora have been unexpected and
unfortunate
ecological effects," the study concluded.
The existence of over a thousand
varieties of plants and
bacteria
that have been genetically altered in the laboratory and
then
tested in the open air adds unpredictable new risks to this
situation. In addition to the various physical and
ecological
disruptions
from novel, but genetically intact organisms
introduced
into a new environment, genetically altered life forms
add an
entirely new dimension of risk. A 1993
study commissioned
by the
Union of Concerned Scientists outlines many scenarios by
which
genetically altered varieties of common food crops can
either
become invasive weeds or pass their unique combinations of
genes
on to native plants with unpredictable consequences.
Inserted
genes can spread into the wild through pollen and through
various
bacterial and viral carriers. The most
likely scenario in
the
U.S. is in the case of crops such as rape seed (canola) and
sunflowers
that have many common wild relatives here.
As genetic
experimentation
spreads into tropical regions from which the
majority
of common food crops originate, the risk factor
multiplies
many fold.
In other words, with hundreds of
genetically altered
varieties
of plants and bacteria being tested in the U.S. alone,
the
risk of affecting native plant species is already quite
serious. If any significant number of these varieties
are to be
grown
in commercial quantities over a wide geographic scale, the
risk
becomes rather extreme. In third world
countries, where
wild,
native varieties of everyday food crops are more common,
there
is a high likelihood of genetic experimentation severely
disrupting
the natural balances of plants and animals which people
have
depended on for thousands of years. A
recent Greenpeace
study
documented unregulated field tests and other development
activities
using GEO's in at least thirteen African, Asian and
Latin
American countries, and eighty illegal releases of patented,
genetically
engineered microbes in India alone. With
virtually no
scientific
resources to monitor the effects of these experiments,
these
countries are entirely dependent on inadequate scientific
information
from countries like the U.S. and Japan where these
technologies
are being developed.
The
Evidence Mounts
Despite the plethora of likely
scenarios for ecological
and
genetic disruption from releases of engineered life forms,
these
scenarios often have a speculative quality that makes it
easy
for industry spokespeople to attack opponents for spreading
unsubstantiated
fears. Until recently, that is. Studies of the
environmental
consequences of genetically altered organisms are in
their
infancy compared to the increasing sophistication of gene
splicing
technologies themselves, for obvious reasons having to do
with
the sources of funding for such research.
However,
scientific
evidence for the viability and disruptive potential of
engineered
organisms is now beginning to accumulate rapidly.
Last year, virologists at Michigan
State University
published
a study demonstrating that virus genes implanted into
plant
cells could be transfered into the DNA of other viruses that
the
plants come into contact with. Dr.
Richard F. Allison told
the New
York Times that this could lead to the unintentional
creation
of new, and perhaps more virulent, plant viruses.
Various
studies have suggested that viruses can also transfer
genes
among plants and perhaps animals as well.
Studies at the
University
of Arizona suggest that parasitic mites may be involved
in
transfering jumping genes known as "P elements" among common
varieties
of fruitflies. When "foreign"
genes begin to spread
among
wild populations of plants and animals, they become
virtually
impossible to trace, no less to control.
One of the most striking presentations
at the Third World
Network
seminar in New York was by Dr. Elaine Ingham, a plant
pathologist
at Oregon State University. Ingham
became concerned
about
the environmental consequences of her colleagues' efforts to
alter
the genetics of a common variety of bacteria found in the
root
systems of most plants. The bacteria
would become able to
digest
crop residues, now considered waste products and often
burned
in large quantities, and produce ethyl alcohol that farmers
could
readily use as a fuel. To some, this
seemed like the
perfect
technological method for turning "waste" products into
something
useful. Ingham set out to discover how
the genetically
altered
bacteria would affect the growth of common grasses in a
variety
of soil types.
Ingham discovered that the altered
bacteria survived
easily
and often outcompeted their parent strains, something
biotech
advocates used to say could never happen.
But the effects
on the
grasses were even more unexpected. In
sandy soil, most of
the
grasses died from alcohol poisoning. In
clay soils, however,
the
grasses also died, but from an entirely different cause. The
altered
bacteria apparently increased the numbers of root-feeding
nematodes
and decreased populations of beneficial soil fungi that
help
grasses resist common diseases.
"We must understand the effects
on the whole system, not
just
isolated portions," Ingham has written, "because
biotechnology
products will have a range of impacts much greater
than
just the engineered organism." In
forest soils, for example,
native
tree species depend on root-dwelling fungi for proper
absorption
of nutrients and water from the soil.
What would
happen
if these bacteria spread from a farmstead into nearby
forests? Other studies described by Ingham have
demonstrated
effects
such as altered carbon dioxide levels, increased plant
disease
and changes in the distribution of other essential soil
microbes
from the introduction of genetically altered organisms
and
their byproducts.
For years, arguments for the safety of
engineered
organisms
depended on claims that they simply could not survive
outside
the controlled environment of laboratories and
experimental
farm plots. Beatrix Tappeser of the
Institute of
Applied
Ecology in Frankfurt, Germany presented a comprehensive
survey
of experiments designed to test this claim, and found
numerous
cases of genetically altered life forms surviving in
surface
water, drinking water, wastewater, soil and even clothing
at
rates comparable to their natural relatives.
In addition,
isolated
fragments of DNA not only survive, but are often
protected
from natural degradation in sewage sludge, and in
particles
suspended in soil, water and animal feces.
These
findings
compound the range of plausible scenarios for
the
uncontrolled spread of traits such as resistance to
antibiotics
and herbicides, production of substances toxic to
various
insects, ability to grow better in salty and otherwise
degraded
soils, and many more subtle biochemical changes. In
light
of recent knowledge about the complexities of gene
expression,
the seriousness of the possible consequences increases
many
fold.
Biotechnology
and International Politics
The Third World Network seminar in New
York was organized
to
educate U.N. delegates and staff in preparation for the
upcoming
annual meeting of the U.N. Commission for Sustainable
Development. But it also became a forum for addressing
several
issues
of immediate concern to third world activists concerned
about
biotechnology. Participants focused
their doubts on the
"environmentally
sound applications of biotechnology" emphasized
in
several key U.N. documents since the 1992 U.N. environmental
summit.
For example, one recent policy
document from the United
Nations
Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), since adopted
by the
Secretary General's office, advocated "capacity building"
in
biotechnology by so-called "developing countries" under U.N.
auspices. While U.N. officials described these
proposals as a
means
for countries to more fully address the consequences of
biotechnology
development, most participants viewed it as a plan
for
international promotion and funding of biotechnology at a
time
when the industry's fortunes on Wall Street are in decline.
German
environmentalist Christine von Weizsaecker explained how
many
countries' science and technology ministries have become
agencies
for the promotion of particular technologies, such as
biotechnology.
An alternate plan described by
international lawyer
Gurdial
Nijar placed priority on evaluating social, ecological,
cultural,
public health and economic impacts of new discoveries
and all
planned releases. Impacts of released
life forms would be
carefully
studied beyond just the immediate areas where releases
take
place, and the burden of proof for claims of safety would be
placed
on those who propose tests of genetically altered
organisms. Nijar proposed an international guarantee of
prior
informed
consent, based on the 1992 Rio Declaration's
Precautionary
Principle, which states, "Where there are threats of
serious
or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty
should
not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent
environmental
degradation."
Since the approval of the Convention
on Biodiversity at
the Rio
"Earth Summit," activists around the world have pressed
for an
added protocol on biosafety to protect native ecosystems
from
the possible consequences of genetic experimentation. While
the
Clinton administration has endorsed the Biodiversity
Convention
shunned by its predecessors in Washington, it has
sought
to reinterpret it to satisfy the persistent objections of
the
biotechnology industry. Specifically,
they objected to
provisions
requiring agribusiness and drug companies to share
their
research with the indigenous peoples who have been the
traditional
caretakers of biodiversity (see Z October 1993). The
U.S.
has also been in the forefront of efforts to oppose a
biosafety
protocol.
Advocates of biotechnology on the
staff of various U.N.
agencies,
as well as the U.S. government, cite the usual claims
about
biotechnology's mission to feed the world, enhance renewable
resources,
improve human health and environmental protection. The
testimony
of scientists and activists skeptical about
biotechnology
only confirms the questionable character of these
claims,
and exposes the long-underreported risks inherent in the
new
genetic technologies. The best antidote
to accusations
by food
industry executives that biotech opponents are using
"scare
tactics" to slow the inevitable acceptance of engineered
foods
may be a heightened understanding of the real consequences
of the
engineered future corporate America so anxiously awaits.
Combined
with the already widespread skepticism toward the
increasing
technological manipulation of food, this may offer our
best
hope that the Brave New World of biotechnology is not as
inevitable
as its proponents would have us believe.
Resources:
Third
World Network, 228 Macalister Rd., 10400 Penang, Malaysia,
twn@igc.apc.org
Food
& Water, Depot Hill Rd., Marshfield, VT 05658, 1-800-EAT-
SAFE,
foodandwater@igc.apc.org
Union
of Concerned Scientists, 26 Church St., Cambridge, MA 02238
Pure
Food Campaign, 860 Hwy. 61E, Little Marais, MN 55614,
1-800-253-0681
Selected
sources:
Ho,
Mae-Wan, "Genetic engineering:
hope or hoax?," Third World
Resurgence,
No. 53/54, Jan./Feb. 1995, pp. 28-9
Meister,
Isabelle and Meyer, Sue, "Genetically Engineered Plants:
Releases
and Impacts on Less Developed Countries," Greenpeace
International,
1994
Mc
Nally, Ruth, "Genetic Madness: The
European Rabies Eradication
Programme,"
The Ecologist, Vol. 24, No. 6, Nov./Dec. 1994, pp.
207-212
Orton,
David, "The Case Against Forest Spraying with the Bacterial
Insecticide
Bt," Alternatives, Vol. 15, No. 1, Dec. 1987, pp. 28-
35
Regal,
Philip J., "Scientific principles for ecologically based
risk
assessment of transgenic organisms," Molecular Ecology, 1994,
Vol. 3,
pp. 5-13
Rennie,
John, "DNA's New Twists," Scientific American, March 1993,
pp.
88-96
Rissler,
Jane and Mellon, Margaret, Perils Amidst the Promise:
Ecological
Risks of Transgenic Crops in a Global Market, Union of
Concerned
Scientists, 1993
Shiva,
Vandana, "Reductionism in Biology and its Effects on
Bioethics,
Biosafety and Biodiversity Erosion," Third World
Network,
1995
Shiva,
Vandana, "Why the engineering paradigm in life forms is
flawed,"
Third World Resurgence, No. 53/54, Jan./Feb. 1995, pp.
25-27
Third
World Network, "The Need for Greater Regulation and Control
of
Genetic Engineering," (228 Macalister Rd., 10400 Penang,
Malaysia),
1995
Tiedje,
James, et. al., "The Planned Introduction of Genetically
Engineered
Organisms: Ecological Considerations
and
Recommendations,"
Ecology, Vol. 70, No. 2, 1989, pp. 298-315
Tokar,
Brian, "Engineering the Future of Life?," Z Magazine,
July/August
1989, pp. 110-116
Tokar,
Brian, et. al., Biotechnology: An Activists' Handbook,
Vermont
Biotechnology Working Group, 1991
Brian
Tokar is the author of The Green Alternative
(Revised
Edition
1992, Philadelphia: New Society Publishers) and the
forthcoming
Renewing the Environmental Revolution (Boston: South
End
Press). He is a long-time activist, a
popular lecturer, and
an
associate faculty member in Social Ecology at Goddard College
in
Plainfield, Vermont.
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