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Gene-spliced wheat stirs global fears

Buyers spur grain before it's planted

February 27
Washington Post

Agricultural scientists have developed the first genetically engineered variety of wheat designed for sale to farmers, stirring intense controversy around the globe years before it is expected to come onto the market.

The wheat, produced by the biotechnology giant Monsanto, has been spliced with a gene that protects it from Monsanto's powerful and popular herbicide Roundup, allowing farmers to kill weeds efficiently without harming their crop. Monsanto says it will be ready for farmers within two to four years, and the company estimates it will increase crop yields by $6 to $11 an acre.

The company hopes the wheat will also lead to other engineered improvements to one of the world's oldest and most important crops, but the international reaction illustrates just how contentious and unpredictable genetically engineered crops have become.

As news of Monsanto's wheat has spread, buyers from Japan to Europe and Egypt have told U.S. exporters that their consumers will not accept genetically modified wheat because of general fears about possible harm to the environment and human health from engineered crops. Some have said that the wheat's very presence on American farms could threaten future purchases of all U.S. wheat. Half of all American wheat is exported, accounting for $3.7 billion in sales and almost 20 percent of all agricultural commodities shipped abroad in 1999.

"We may in the future have a biotech wheat that the world does want," said Darrell Hanavan, chairman of a joint wheat industry committee on biotechnology. "But we need to proceed now under the assumption that some markets won't want it anytime soon. And the challenge will be to make sure that buyers and their customers get exactly what they want."

In an effort to respond to these concerns, Monsanto has agreed to an unprecedented wheat industry request to put in place a system to strictly segregate the modified wheat before it is ever sold to farmers or even approved by regulators. The company has also agreed generally to promote wheat biotechnology to buyers and consumers abroad.

"Some farmers do have concerns about the market for our wheat, but many really want it," said Monsanto spokesman Mark Buckingham. "Farmers need to make improvements and reduce costs, and farmers know our technology can provide that . . . We want to be frank and open because in the current atmosphere, it's very easy for misconceptions to arise."

About 55 percent of U.S. soybeans and 25 percent of corn harvested last year were genetically engineered. Development of genetically modified wheat has lagged behind other crops because it is a more complex plant, made from the union of three wild grasses that have been improved by farmers over the millennia. Rights to wheat varieties are often publicly owned, which can make them less desirable to profit-making companies.

Since last year's Starlink corn debacle -- in which an engineered corn only approved for animal consumption inadvertently made it into the human food supply -- already negative attitudes in major foreign markets about genetically modifed foods have intensified.

The result is that unlike the American corn and soybean industries, which quickly embraced biotech products in the mid-1990s, many in the wheat industry are approaching biotechnology now more as a challenge to surmount than an immediate opportunity to exploit. That wheat has an unusual emotional resonance for many people stemming from its use in bread, the ancient "staff of life," just adds to the challenge.

"Monsanto's wheat can definitely be a real benefit to the producers and our country," said Phil Isaak, a board member of U.S. Wheat Associates, the national organization that promotes American wheat exports for growers. "But unless we get worldwide public approval of it, we have to take the position of resisting release for commercialization."

Critics of biotechnology call the worldwide debate over genetically modified wheat a positive development, and are pleased it is happening well before the crop is actually introduced. While major U.S. scientific organizations have generally found that current genetically engineered crops pose no danger to the environment or human health, opponents argue that taking genes from one kind of plant or animal and inserting it into another could have unforeseen long-term consequences.

"It is a very healthy thing for people to be asking now if we really need this wheat, if it's wise to release it and whether it will benefit people who need help," said Margaret Mellon of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "This has never happened before with a major product of biotechnology."

Monsanto's wheat is being tested in greenhouses in the upper Midwest and bred into local varieties. Company officials say they are in no rush to introduce Roundup Ready wheat, and will bring it onto the market gradually when they do. The company has asked for Environmental Protection Agency approval to add wheat to the approved list of crops for its Roundup herbicide, but has not yet approached two other federal agencies.

Industry and company officials said they hoped to devise a segregation system for engineered wheat -- which would parallel those already in place for some special conventional varieties -- by year's end.

Montana wheat farmer Frank Elling said he would be happy to use Roundup Ready wheat if he was certain customers would accept it. But his Pacific Rim buyers have made their reservations known, and Asian governments have taken dramatic steps in recent years to reject shipments of genetically modified crops.

Japanese officials, for instance, turned back a boatload of corn last year suspected to contain the Starlink variety, and Thai officials did the same with a shipment of wheat 18 months ago. In that case, officials concluded that the American wheat had been mixed with small amounts of engineered corn while being transported from the West Coast.

Similar messages of concern have been coming in to the 17 international offices of U.S. Wheat Associates, the American export marketing group. A letter from Tsutoma Shigeta of the Japan Flour Millers Association said, for instance, that "Japanese consumers are highly suspicious and skeptical about safety of [genetically modified] farm products which may be hazardous to human health and environment. Under the circumstances, I strongly doubt that any bakery and noodle products made of [modified] wheat or even conventional wheat that may contain [modified] wheat will be accepted in the Japanese market."

Jef Smidts of the Dutch wheat supplier Andre & Cie wrote even more bluntly, "[Genetically modified] wheat for sure will be a market destructor." Because of such concerns, legislators in Montana and North Dakota have introduced bills to place a moratorium on the use of genetically engineered wheat.

Val Giddings, vice president for food and agriculture for the Biotechnology Industry Organization, said he has heard similar concerns, but that he believes the "perception of resistance is substantially greater than the reality is likely to be.

"Monsanto has recognized and is acting on the understanding that some folks want to have more input into this product," he said. "They are trying to do this in an open and transparent way, and that is not without risk."

GE parties fight to finish

February 26
New Zealand Herald

Accusations of false evidence and a fight over who gets the final say have broken out as the Royal Commission on Genetic Modification prepares to wrap up.

Life Sciences Network, an umbrella group of industry and scientists who support genetic engineering, wants the chance to contradict evidence given by groups opposed to GE and to put new evidence before the commission.

In particular, Life Sciences Network wants to refute claims by a key Green Party witness, Dr Elaine Ingham of Oregon State University, that genetic engineering could devastate plant life.

But the network also wants to put new evidence to the four commissioners, a move that has angered Greenpeace.

"Life Sciences Network are using this opportunity to present unchallenged evidence to the commission and we've expressed concern about that," Greenpeace spokeswoman Annette Cotter said.

She said extensive cross-examination of witnesses had already been allowed during the hearings.

"We don't see what the commission would gain from the presentation of further rebuttal evidence."

Commission media officer Sarah Adamson said a legal opinion from the commission's lawyers allowed for rebuttal or new evidence.

"The opportunity is there and it's up to the commissioners to determine whether it's new evidence.

"One of the tests will be, why wasn't it presented at the time?

"But one day has been allocated and I would expect it will be used."

The commission will hold just one more week of formal hearings followed by closing submissions from March 12 to 15.

The date for rebuttal or new evidence is March 9.

The commission is due to hand its report to the Coalition Government by June 1.

Meanwhile, church groups have told the commission that evil as well as good could come from genetic science.

Religious groups, including Anglicans, Quakers and Jews, put their case and called for a conservative approach to genetic engineering.

"Profit maximization" and "market share" were forces which could trample over society's less powerful groups, the Anglican Church told the commission.

Genetic modification of organisms needed to be strongly regulated, the church said, to "moderate the excesses of corporate enthusiasm."

New Zealand Anglicans were strongly opposed to the transfer of genes between species, particularly transferring human genes to animals, the church said.

The Jewish community told the commission that its members had concerns that genetic engineering of food was not kosher and called for compulsory food labeling.

Many Jews objected to genetically modified foods because Kashrut, Judaism's dietary law, prohibits the mixture of plant and animal species.

They asked the commission to respect Jews' religious rights by recommending that all GE foods be labeled.

The Quaker community said release of GE material into the New Zealand agricultural environment should be banned and said its members wanted a moratorium of no less than 10 to 15 years on all GE plant or animal production or field trials.

They called for another inquiry into GE and said all food that contained any GE material should be labeled.

The present food labeling requirement, due to come into effect within the next year, calls for foods with 1 per cent or more GE content to be labeled.

Last views

* Maori organizations will put their case to the commission this week in what is the final week of formal hearings

* A national hui will be held on April 6, 7 and 8 to wrap up the commission's Maori consultation program. It will be held at Turangawaewae Marae

* Applications for groups to put rebuttal evidence to the commission close next Friday at 5 pm

* Ten groups put their evidence to the commission last week, including church groups and organic farmers

Europe becoming two-tier GM/non-GM market - Toepfer

February 26
Reuters

WASHINGTON - Europe is becoming a two-tier market due to consumer skepticism toward genetically modified grains and oilseeds, a top analyst for Toepfer International said on Friday.

US farmers are world leaders in adoption of the crops, which they say allow superior weed control, lower costs and higher yields. They say the crops are safe and should be accepted worldwide. EU allows import of GM soybeans but not all GM corn (maize) varieties.

"The EU is becoming a two-tier market," Schumacher said in a speech at the US Agriculture Department's annual Outlook Forum, with premiums going to non-GM crops.

One effect of a European preference for traditional crops marketed at higher prices, he said, would be that Europe "will lose competitiveness on the livestock product side."

Similarly, support for less intensive farming practices, dubbed "class not mass," could constrain meat production in Europe.

EU officials have banned for six months the use of meat and bone meal as a livestock feed supplement as a precaution against spread of mad cow disease.

While some analyses say the EU would need 3 million tons of soymeal as a substitute source of protein, Schumacher said the increase in demand "is expected to be only one million tons higher at 28 million tons for calendar 2001.

Meat consumption is down, reducing the need for livestock feed, Schumacher said, and EU farmers will put more grain into livestock rations as well. About 3 million additional to~???be used as feed.

On the horizon, Schumacher said, were EU moves to reduce price guarantees to grain and oilseed farmers. That would allow EU grain to be exported routinely without use of export subsidies. "In fact, exports subsidies should become necessary only in times of extremely low international grain prices," he said.

Biotech moths set to battle their own

Science: The first field trial of gene-altered insects aims to reduce population of pests

February 25
AP

By tinkering with genes, scientists have made tomatoes that stay fresher longer, crops that are immune to weedkillers and fish that grow faster. Now, a genetically engineered insect is emerging from the lab.

The first field trial of a biotech insect - a pink bollworm moth that contains a jellyfish gene - is planned for summer. The gene causes the moth larvae to be fluorescent.

If the experiment involving a major pest for cotton-growers goes as planned, scientists are ready with their next step: testing a biotech version, called the "Terminator" by farmers, that is sterile but sexually active; it is designed to mate with wild relatives and eliminate their offspring.

Nearly 3,600 moths with the jellyfish genes are to be set free under screened cages in a government-owned cotton field near Phoenix. The next step would be to add genes that make the moths sterile.

"We're being very, very careful about what we're doing," said Robert Staten, an Agriculture Department scientist who will run the field trial.

The experiment is being conducted and regulated by the department's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service because of its authority for controlling plant pests. Staten expects the agency to grant approval in spring for the release.

"We're going to take as conservative an approach as we can and still move forward," Staten said.

Some biotech critics are alarmed, while some scientists who support the technology say the government is not prepared to properly regulate biotech insects.

Under development, for example, are disease-preventing mosquitoes that could deliver vaccines to the people they bite or carry their own antibiotics.

"When you're talking about insects you're talking about extremely promiscuous organisms that will mutate and breed quite uncontrollably," said Charles Margulis, an anti-biotech activist with the environmental group Greenpeace.

He said there is no guarantee that an insect designed to be sterile will turn out that way.

The pink bollworm moth infects about 500,000 acres of cotton in the Southwest. Farmers have three options to control them: spray a lot of insecticide; plant an expensive variety of genetically engineered cotton that makes its own insecticide; or release moths sterilized by irradiation.

Irradiated moths are less effective in areas with heavy infestation because the treatment damages the insects so much that they are slow to mate. The genetically engineered moth is designed to have the same sexual prowess as its wild cousins.

"He'd be fully sexually aggressive and go out and meet and breed. He'd be the first guy in the bars at night," said John Benson, a farmer in the Imperial Valley and a member of the California Cotton Pest Control Board, which has funded the research.

"We see this as the one sure way to get eradication," he said.

It takes 60 irradiated moths for every wild one to make sure there are enough to mate and eliminate the chance of offspring. With the biotech moths, a 5-to-1 ratio is sufficient, said Thomas Miller, a University of California, Riverside entomologist who developed the moth.

The biotech moths would be cheaper for farmers to use than the gene-altered cotton, Miller said. The biotech cotton, although highly effective, costs farmers up to $30 an acre more than conventional cotton.

Some biotech critics are concerned that overuse of the gene-altered cotton, known as Bt for the insecticide it contains, will lead to an increase in insect resistance to Bt sprays, which are used on fruit and vegetable crops.

Use of a biotech moth to control pink bollworm infestations makes that resistance less likely to develop, said Charles Benbrook, an agricultural consultant.

This summer's experiment with the biotech moths will be conducted in three cages, each about 12 feet wide by 24 feet long. The cotton field in which they are placed is surrounded by a 6-foot chain-link fence to deter vandals. There is little chance of the moths escaping "barring a major weather catastrophe," according to the application for the release.

As a precaution, the moths containing the jellyfish genes will be irradiated to ensure that even if they do escape they can't reproduce. The gene-altered moths will then be studied to see if there is any unusual behavior.

Escaped farm salmon raise alarm in Maine

February 23
Boston Globe

The mighty December Northeaster rocked Maine's Machias Bay, buckling steel cages that held thousands of farm-raised fish and uprooting the pens' moorings.

By the storm's end, conservationists' worst fear for this burgeoning industry had come true: More than 100,000 fish swam out of the pens into the wild - the largest known escape of aquaculture fish in the eastern United States.

Some of the young fish, fattened up for restaurant dinner plates, were quickly consumed by hungry seals. But the unknown number that survived have the potential to severely weaken future generations of wild salmon in three Maine rivers. If the young fish make their way to the rivers when they get older, they may mate with the wild salmon.

But word of the accident, which environmentalists consider a potential ecological disaster, reached federal officials only this month, partly because of loopholes in the law and a Maine state official's forgetfulness. Yesterday, one day after they learned of the accident, the conservation groups Atlantic Salmon Federation, Trout Unlimited, and Conservation Law Foundation called for a moratorium on new fish farms and an overhaul of the entire regulation system.

''The point to be made is it looks like the feds were right. Salmon do escape,'' said Paul Nickerson, a US Fish and Wildlife biologist specializing in endangered species.

The US government in November listed wild salmon in eight Maine rivers as endangered, in part because of concern about the impact of the aquaculture industry in eastern Maine. ''This is what we've been afraid of,'' Nickerson said.

The fear is that farm-raised fish, bred for market qualities quite unlike the hardiness that wild salmon must have to survive, will pass their weaknesses on by mating with the few wild fish left.

Industry officials have previously argued that escapes from farm pens are rare, and interbreeding with wild fish even rarer.

Atlantic Salmon of Maine officials, from whose pens the fish escaped, said they lost close to $1 million when the fish swam away about five miles off Machias. What's more, they said, the accident could have been prevented if the federal government had allowed them to build the stronger, more weather-resistant cages they asked for last year. The Army Corps of Engineers turned down the request because construction could disturb a nearby island's rare eagle nest, according to Des FitzGerald, who runs Atlantic Salmon of Maine, and several sources. Corps officials could not be reached for comment yesterday.

''Earthquakes happen,'' said FitzGerald. ''We didn't want to lose those fish. We want to keep them in pens more than anyone else does. But we should have been allowed to build that stronger pen.''

FitzGerald and other fish farmers have long said that even in the unlikely event of a fish farm escape, there would be little genetic threat to the wild salmon - because they have already been virtually eliminated and are sustained only by annual releases of new salmon raised in hatcheries. Even Governor Angus King has joined them, saying decades of salmon stocking in Maine's rivers has made the question of a ''wild'' genetic bloodline all but moot.

However, environmentalists counter that the wild salmon remain genetic marvels capable of surviving an arduous journey to Greenland, only to return to the exact river of their birth to reproduce. Fish that have been bred to grow quickly in a pen shouldn't mingle with them, they argue.

While federal officials were concerned about the escape yesterday, they said it could have been worse. If the fish had been sexually mature and it had been spawning season, they might have headed straight for the three closest rivers with wild salmon populations: the Dennys, Machias, and East Machias.

Still, no one knows how penned fish will act in the wild. Befuddled and used to being fed three times a day, they may be eaten quickly. But some could survive and there is no telling if they would have the instinct to head to a river to spawn, go back to the cage they were raised in, or do something else.

''We don't know what will happen,'' said Mary Colligan, an endangered-species coordinator for National Marine Fisheries Service.

The release is the latest in a line of controversies touching aquaculture in Maine. Launched in the 1980s, the $65 million industry is trying to cash in on growing worldwide consumption of farm-raised fish as wild stocks collapse. It is now the second-largest fishery (behind lobsters) in Maine, with 45 coastal sites where salmon are raised.

Increasing scrutiny has popped up with the fish pens. There are now seven government agencies planning to institute or bolster regulation of the fish farms - and FitzGerald and other farmers say they may not be able to weather them. Meanwhile, a lawsuit charges that concentrated fish waste, extra fish food, and chemicals used to clean the fish are streaming into the sea.

Now, however, escapees have caught public attention. Last month, 3,000 to 5,000 fish escaped from a pen in Eastport, Maine.

''Based on these two events alone, the number of aquaculture escapees this fall is 1,000 times the number of documented wild adults,'' said Andrew Goode of the Atlantic Salmon Federation.

The smaller release was reported promptly to federal authorities, but the large escape highlights a major loophole in regulations for fish farms. Despite the concern about escapees, fish farms are not obligated to report them. FitzGerald did call the state of Maine as a courtesy when the 100,000 salmon escaped. But an official there didn't tell the federal government until this month because, he said, he first wanted to get more information and then it slipped his mind.

''The state's failure to report this event for over seven weeks highlights the need for federal involvement in aquaculture permitting to protect Maine's wild salmon,'' said Jeff Reardon of Trout Unlimited. ''We need this now.''

Agriculture: Transgenics lose ground, but refuse to give up

February 21
IPS

Mexico City - The rate of growth of the number of hectares planted in transgenic crops worldwide has fallen off drastically in the past two years, following a three-year boom that began in 1996, leading environmentalists to begin to speak of a crisis in the sector.

However, advocates and producers of genetically modified crops are not giving up, and have announced a new offensive to boost sales of seeds.

Speaking at a meeting on trade and the environment running Monday through Wednesday in Mexico City, Hope Shand, the director of the Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI), a Canada-based non-governmental organization (NGO), said that despite the slowdown in the industry's growth, there is no room for complacency regarding GMOs, which continue to pose a threat.

The area covered by crops that have been genetically engineered with the genes of other species to boost productivity or make them resistant to pests grew 25-fold from 1996 to 2000: from 1.7 million hectares to around 43 million.

The boom in transgenic crops put environmental groups on the alert, as well as governments which decided to limit the introduction of genetically modified organisms due to the lack of conclusive evidence on whether or not they pose a risk to health or the environment.

As the debate on the question continued to rage, the annual rate of growth of transgenic crops fell from 44 percent in 1998 to eight percent over the past two years, according to a study by RAFI.

The ''International Conference on Trade, the Environment and Sustainable Development: Prospects for Latin America and the Caribbean'' was organized by the Centro de Estudios para el Cambio en el Campo Mexicano (CECCAM), the Centro de Analisis Social, Informacion y Formacion Popular (CASIFOP), and RAFI under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).

The drop in production of transgenics indicates that the furor over genetically modified crops is entering into crisis, states the report by RAFI, which adds that industry analysts say sales of transgenic seeds are starting to level off.

In the meantime, Monsanto, the world's leading producer of transgenic seeds, announced early this month that its plans this year include an aggressive campaign promoting genetically modified organisms in the United States, Asia and Latin America.

Monsanto hopes to significantly boost its seed sales, particularly in Argentina and Brazil, said a company executive, Hendrik Verfaillie.

Biotech companies argue that while there are no conclusive studies demonstrating that transgenics pose a risk, their research and development will save millions of people from hunger by making crops easier and faster to produce.

The International Food Policy Research Institute warned that global food production was facing severe risks today due to soil degradation, drought and pollution.

Transnational corporations like Monsanto argue that genetically modified organisms are the solution, because fast-growing or vitamin- fortified crops can be developed, as well as crops that can be grown in severe conditions.

In 1999, 34.8 million hectares were planted with Monsanto's genetically-engineered seeds, accounting for 87 percent of the total land surface under transgenics that year, says the RAFI study.

Monsanto dominates 80 percent of the global market for transgenic seeds, while firms like Aventis, Syngenta, BASF and Dupont account for percentages ranging from three to seven percent.

Last year, nearly all of the transgenic crops, which are basically corn, soy bean, cotton and rapeseed, were planted in the United States, Canada and Argentina.

Attempts to market such products globally fell flat, because a number of countries, especially European nations, blocked imports, while others announced that they would soon follow suit.

In addition, genetically modified foods were rejected by consumer movements in many parts of the world, while in other areas they are sold without labels identifying them as transgenic products, or are smuggled across borders, according to the international environmental lobby Greenpeace.

Experts say transgenics could be a vehicle for unknown diseases, and pose a threat to native plant species and biodiversity.

Environmentalists and other also argue that it is not fair that a handful of transnational giants have the power over biotechnology, and decide how to market their seeds and at what price.

The arrival of the biotechnology that gave rise to transgenic crops has led to economic changes that are transforming the chains of production in favor of concentration in the hands of a few large companies, Walter Pengue, with the University of Buenos Aires' center of advanced studies, told participants at the conference.

The biotech revolution is taking shape based on an invisible alliance between international trade and transnational corporations that back the deregulation of transgenic products, said Lucía Gallardo, with Accion Ecologica de Ecuador, who referred to her experience coordinating the Ecuador-based Network for a Latin America Free of Transgenics.

The RAFI report urges environmentalists and consumers to remain on guard against transnationals that are keen on selling more and more transgenic seeds.

On Feb 14, the European Union approved new legislative restrictions on the production and sale of transgenic foods, while it is studying the possibility of declaring a three-year moratorium on licenses to produce genetically modified organisms.

In just a few years, the production of transgenics took on global dimensions, and in May 2000, the Biosafety Protocol was signed in the Colombian resort city of Cartagena, promoting the regulation of the global trade in biotech products.