Son of Frankenfoods:
GE Trees, Fish, and Functional Foods

While OEFFA has taken a stand against Genetically Engineered Foods, this article does not necessarily reflect the views of OEFFA.
For background information on GE Foods and OEFFA's work, contact the OEFFA office.

News and Analysis on Genetic Engineering, Factory Farming, & Organics
by: Ronnie Cummins
BioDemocracy News #28 - July 2000
BioDemocracy News is a publication of the Organic Consumers Association
www.purefood.org

Frankenfight Round Two:
Get Ready for the Next Generation of GE Foods and Crops

Evidence continues to mount that the First Wave of genetically engineered(GE) foods and crops (recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone, herbicide-resistant,virus-spliced, and Bt-spliced crops) are in serious trouble. Although the Gene Giants are struggling harder than ever to keep up appearances, mounting global opposition to Frankenfoods--and adverse reports from the lab and fields--signal the beginning of the end for the first generation of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). Although critics and campaigners still find ourselves fully occupied in slowing down and reversing the First Wave of mutant crops, the international balance of forces are starting to tip in our favor. Among the favorable signs are the following:

* Increasing global opposition to GE foods and crops, including now North America. Almost 90% of gene-crops are currently produced in the US and Canada. While major foreign export markets for GE-tainted foods and seeds continue, slowly but surely, to close down (Europe, Japan, South Korea,Brazil) consumer opposition in Canada and the US increases month by month--in spite of, or perhaps even partly because of, the multi million dollar PR campaign being waged by ag biotech interests. Latest industry-funded polls show 59% of Canadians flatly opposed to GE foods, while 51% in the US say the same thing--with the overwhelming majority in both countries expressing mounting concern over the lack of safety-testing and labeling. In Europe up to 70% adamantly oppose GMOs, while 82% of Japanese are opposed. In response North American farmers are already starting to cut back on major GE crops--corn, soybeans, and canola. Latest July USDA estimates show a 20% drop in GE corn acreage and a 6% drop in soybeans, while Canada analysts predict a 10% reduction in GE canola.

* Leading food companies and supermarket chains all over the world, fearing the growing consumer backlash, are removing, or else preparing to remove,GE ingredients from their brand-name products. As soon as giant supermarket chains and global meat and fish companies ban GE grains and animal feeds--a basically irreversible process already well underway--the global market for American corn and soya will collapse. Although there was only a 6%drop in US farmers planting Roundup Ready soybeans this year, by next year we can expect major reductions.

* Adverse reports from the lab and fields. As predicted for years by biotech critics: canola super weeds have appeared in Canada; Bt crops are damaging beneficial insects and soil microorganisms, promoting pest resistance,and disrupting ecological balances so that previous minor pests like Stink Bugs on cotton are proliferating; increased IGF-1 levels in rBGH-derived milk is posing higher cancer risks; herbicide-resistant soybeans are decreasing yields and causing farmers to use 2-5 times more herbicides than conventional farmers; antibiotic-resistant genes (found in all GE foods) are transferring "horizontally" from Frankenfoods into the bacteria of the digestive tract, so that animals and humans ingesting GMOs are likely incubating ever more virulent pathogens; and Cauliflower Mosaic Viral Promoters (found in almost all GE foods) are likely setting off hazardous biochemical reactions in our bodies. For more information on GE hazards see the Organic Consumers Association website www.purefood.org and its links.

A recent Wall Street report showed little enthusiasm on the part of investors for purchasing Monsanto's stock. Leading life science corporations like Pharmacia & Upjohn, Novartis, Dupont, and Aventis are either decreasing planned ag biotech investments or else spinning off their ag biotech divisions. In short prospects have dimmed for the Biotech Century. But don't worry the gene engineers tell us, even if you haven't liked the Cafe Biotech menu thus far, you'll just love the second generation of GMOs currently being cooked up in our labs, test plots, fish tanks, and tree farms.

A look at the propaganda and activities of the Gene Giants reveal a simple yet sinister five-year plan:

* Distract consumers from worrying about the ever more obvious hazards of the first generation of GE foods and crops by dazzling them with tales of how the next generation of GMOs will (1) feed the starving masses; (2)nourish and vaccinate the poor; (3) make foods, even junk foods, more nutritious;and (4) solve the problems created by the unsustainable practices of the global timber, paper, and fishing industries.

* Delay or derail strict national and international regulation of GMOs based upon the precautionary principle by cutting "backdoor deals" among the bureaucrats of the largest G-8 and OECD nations. Create further delays by prolonging endless debate at World Trade Organization meetings or the Codex Alimentarius.

* By the time the Gene Giants delay regulations and distract the public for 3-5 years, GMOs and GMO contamination in the environment will be so pervasive that the public will become fatalistic. By then the second generation of GMOs will be on the market and the Luddites and anti-globalization campaigners will have been divided, coopted, or defeated.

The only way we can stop this diabolical plan from succeeding is by waging a protracted battle on two fronts. While stepping up our resistance to the First Wave of Frankenfoods and crops and literally driving them off the market, we must simultaneously start to educate and mobilize the global grassroots against the forthcoming Second Wave of GMOs. For a start let's take a critical look at GE functional foods, trees, and fish.

Gene-Altered "Functional Foods" --Dubious Benefits and Human Health Risks

One of the central myths propagated by ag biotech over the past few years is that GE crops will increase farm productivity and feed the world's 800 million hungry people. But as respected anti-hunger organizations like Oxfam, Christian Aid, and Food First, and experts like Vandana Shiva have revealed, this claim is nothing more than a lie www.purefood.org/ge/gerice.cfm and www.purefood.org/Corp/tenreasons.cfm. The world already produces twice as much food as necessary to provide all six billion of us with a nutritious and adequate diet now. Sensing that many people are no longer swallowing the "GE Will Feed the World" myth, the Gene Giants have had to modify their tune. Now they say that new gene-altered "functional foods" being readied for market will be fortified with vitamins, spliced with disease-fighting capabilities, or altered so as to be less fatty and healthier.

The flagship product of GE functional foods is the so-called vitamin A enhanced "Golden Rice,'' bankrolled to the tune of $100 million by the Rockefeller Foundation and offered by the GE Giants as a "gift" to the developing world. Unfortunately this miracle rice is a hoax, and likely a dangerous hoax as well.

First of all poor people have vitamin A or Beta-Carotene deficiencies,not because there's something wrong with the non-genetically engineered rice they're eating, but because they don't have the money or resources to eat a well-rounded diet with lots of green and yellow vegetables, fruits,and fish. Even if Golden Rice will actually grow in the real world in diverse terrain and climates (an open question since so far it's only been grown in the lab), for poverty-stricken people unable to afford much more than rice it's not going to solve their nutritional problems. The insidious consequence of Golden Rice and related myths of other GE functional foods is that it may delay or indefinitely distract the world community from getting to the root of the problem-- i.e. poverty and injustice. Wasting billions of dollars subsidizing research on GE crops is worse than misguided,it's literally criminal. Land reform, poverty reduction, and sustainable/organic agriculture are the solution to world hunger, not genetic engineering.

Second of all genetically engineered rice (and other functional foods)will still contain potentially hazardous GE constructs such as viral promoters(derived from the Cauliflower Mosaic Virus) and, most likely, antibiotic-resistant marker genes as well. In addition scientists warn that over consuming Vitamin A can be dangerous for pregnant women, young children, people with liver disease, diabetics, and people with hyperthyroid conditions. How do the gene engineers propose to regulate the dose of Beta-Carotene that people will be ingesting with a diet composed primarily of Golden Rice? And of course similar hazards arise when you look at other vitamin-enhanced GE foods in the pipeline such as soybeans and other grains or vegetables. Even scarier is the notion of dosing people with indeterminate amounts of live vaccines or medicines gene-spliced into their food. Not to mention the ecological consequences of drug or vaccine-spliced plants spreading their mutant characteristics into non-GE crop varieties or related species via genetic pollution.