Main page 

News

Issues

Weather

Pak APIN

College Point

Crop Update

Water Status

Market Price

Model Farming

New Agri-Tech 

Bio Technology

Help Desk

Behtak the forum

Feed back

Email

Agri Overview

Directory

Advisory / BIOTECHNOLOGY

Environmental impacts of genetic engineering 

The introduction of genetically engineered organisms into complex ecosystems is a global experiment with unpredictable and irreversible consequences. Genetic pollution may be passed on to all future generations of life. 

1. Continued industrialisation of agriculture 

2. Genetic pollution 

3. Insect-resistant crops 

4. Impacts upon biodiversity 

5. Genetic instability and crop failures 

6. Genetic engineering and world hunger 

1. Continued industrialisation of agriculture

Many companies are trying to persuade the public that genetic engineering will reduce the use of damaging herbicides, yet these same companies are actually increasing production capacity for the herbicides themselves (1) and requesting permits for higher residues of these chemicals in GE food (2). Until now, most of the research by GE companies has focused on making crops resistant to their own 'broad-spectrum' herbicides. This means that a field can be sprayed with chemicals and nearly all plants will die except for the resistant crop. Out of the 2708 million hectares of genetically engineered crops planted worldwide in 1998, 71% were herbicide-resistant (3). In the US the seeds are sold under a contract which specifies that if farmers save seeds to plant again the following year or use any herbicide other than the company's own, they are likely to be prosecuted (4). 

"Biotechnology is being developed with the same vision that promoted chemicals to meet the single, short-term goals of enhanced yields and profit margins. This vision embraces a view of the world characterised by beliefs that nature should be dominated, exploited and forced to yield more; by preferences for simple, quick, immediately profitable 'solutions' to complex ecological problems; by 'reductionist' thinking that analyses complex systems like farming in terms of component parts, rather than as an integrated system; and by a conviction that agricultural success means short-term productivity gains, rather than long-term sustainability." 

Jane Rissler (Union of Concerned Scientists) (5) 

While genetic engineering continues to be promoted as the only realistic option for feeding the world in the next millennium, the public is responding to the excesses of industrialised farming practices by turning towards organic food (6). This response is not lost on the industry, which has been quick to adopt the image of sustainability. In reality, however, the widespread use of this technology has the potential to threaten the very basis of the ecosystems upon which we depend. 


2. Genetic Pollution

Genes that have been engineered into plants and animals can be transferred to other species. Studies have suggested that there could a rapid spread of genes from GE oilseed rape to its weedy (and non-weedy) relatives. Under field conditions, genes from oilseed rape that had been genetically engineered to be resistant to glufosinate, a broad-spectrum herbicide, crossed to weedy species after just two generations(1). Research in Germany has shown that the glufosinate resistance gene can be transferred to crops in fields 200 metres away(2).
  
Food plants are being engineered to produce pharmaceuticals and industrial chemicals. These plants could cross-pollinate with related species and contaminate the food supply (3). 

Many species of GE fish are being tested and kept on fish farms. A growth hormone gene was engineered into salmon and attached to promoter that forced the hormone to be expressed at very high levels. The salmon grew up to 50 times their normal length in a single year and on average were 5 times as big (4). In some parts of Norway escaped fish from fish farms outnumber native ones by 5 to 1 (5). 

GE mites, mosquitoes and nematodes have been created in laboratories for a variety of purposes (6). Commercialisation of these organisms would lead to their widespread release into the environment. These creatures reproduce quickly and travel over considerable distances. 

A company called Biotechnica International conducted field trials with soya beans in 1989 which included coating the beans with a GE micro-organism in an attempt to increase nitrogen fixation. At the end of the season the plants and seeds were incinerated, the fields were ploughed under and a new crop was planted. Subsequent monitoring showed that the GE micro-organisms had been spread over 4 acres by the ploughing and were out-competing micro-organisms that normally lived in the soil (7). 

Laboratory experiments in 1998 demonstrated that gene transfer could occur from GE sugar beet to commonly occurring soil bacteria called Acenitobacter. In theory, any insects, birds or other animals could pick up this bacteria from the soil and transfer it wherever they go (8). 

Once released, the new living organisms made by genetic engineering are able to interact with other forms of life, reproduce, transfer their characteristics and mutate in response to environmental influences. In most cases they can never be recalled or contained. Any mistakes or undesirable consequences could be passed on to all future generations of life. 

3. Insect-resistant crops

Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) is a soil bacterium which produces a toxin that is highly valued by organic farmers as a safe and effective bio-pesticide. It targets particular species and is used in occasional applications, especially in instances where there is a serious pest infestation. Crop plants have now been engineered with the gene for the Bt toxin so that they have an in-built insecticide. These GE 'insect-resistant' crops were grown on 7.7 million hectares worldwide in 1998 (1). In marked contrast to the occasional application of the Bt toxin in organic farming, the GE Bt toxin is produced in the plants all the time they are growing. This means that insects are continually exposed to the toxin, and are therefore under constant pressure to develop resistance (2). The US Environmental Protection Agency has predicted that most target insects are likely to build up resistance to Bt within 3 to 5 years as a result (3). This will permanently destroy the effective use of Bt in organic agriculture. 

In addition, the genetically engineered Bt is present in form that may harm a wider range of insects. 

A recent study in Switzerland found that when lacewings (beneficial insects that prey on crop pests) were fed cornborers raised on Bt maize, the lacewings suffered from disruption to their development and increased mortality (4). 
The use of other insect toxins in GE crops, such as a lectin from the snowdrop, has also shown worrying signs of effects on the food chain. In a laboratory experiment, female ladybirds were fed on aphids that had been eating insect-resistant potatoes. Compared to ladybirds fed on a normal diet, they laid fewer eggs and lived half as long (5).


4. Impacts upon biodiversity

In the current climate of deforestation, pollution and habitat destruction at least 30,000 species are facing extinction every year (1). The UN Food and Agricultural Organisation estimates that we have lost 75% of the genetic diversity that we had in agriculture at the beginning of this century (2). The use of genetic engineering in agriculture goes hand in hand with the globalisation of monoculture farming practices which has been a major factor in the erosion of species diversity. 

"Although biotechnology has the capacity to create a greater variety of commercial plants, the trend set forth by Trans National Corporations is to create broad international markets for a single product, thus creating the conditions for genetic uniformity in rural landscapes." 

Miguel Altieri (3) 

Genetic uniformity leads to vulnerability because pressure from animal pests, diseases and weeds is higher in areas where the same crop is grown all year round (4). One cause of the Irish potato famine last century was genetic uniformity in the potato crop which meant that all the potatoes were susceptible to a single disease. 

Biodiversity is traditionally understood to be the very basis of food security. The more genetic diversity there is within an agricultural system, the more that system is able to accommodate challenges from pests, disease or climatic conditions which tend only to affect certain varieties (5). 

Mexico's Huastec Indian communities have a highly sophisticated form of forest management in which they cultivate over 300 different plants in a mixture of small gardens, agricultural fields and forest plots (6).
 
One village in north-east India grows up to 70 different varieties of rice (7). In West Bengal, 124 'weed' species collected from rice fields have economic importance for farmers (8). 

In the Expana region of Mexico, farmers make use of 435 wild plant and animal species of which 229 are eaten (9).
 
Parallels can be drawn between the 'gene revolution' and the 'Green Revolution'. The 'Green Revolution' was a massive government and corporate campaign that persuaded farmers in the Third World to replace a multitude of indigenous crops with a few high yielding varieties dependent on expensive inputs of chemicals and fertilisers. This led to huge losses in genetic diversity. Many of the indigenous varieties that farmers used to grow have now been lost for ever (10). 

There are plans to genetically engineer major crops such as rice and wheat with new traits such as increased salt tolerance. This may enable them to be grown in areas which would previously have been regarded as unsuitable and reserved for indigenous crop plants more suited to local conditions. These traits could give GE crops the ability to compete with plants native to these ecosystems. The introduction of foreign species is a major cause of ecological disruption and erosion of biodiversity. In the United States 42% of the species on the threatened or endangered species list are at risk primarily because of non-indigenous species (11) costing the US economy an estimated $123 billion a year (12). 


5. Genetic instability and crop failures

Much of the promotion of genetic enginnering has centred on future benefits which have not yet been substantiated. Instability in GE crop lines has already led to crop failures which, unsurprisingly, have not been well reported by the industry. 

In 1997, crop failure affected 30,000 acres of GE herbicide-resistant cotton in Mississippi. Some growers faced losses of 1/2 to 1 million dollars each (1). Monsanto, producer of the Roundup Ready cotton, reportedly paid out millions of dollars in out of court settlements. In 1998, the Mississippi Seed Arbitration Council ruled that Monsanto's cotton failed to perform as advertised and recommended payments of nearly $2 million to three cotton farmers who suffered severe losses (2). 
In 1994, Calgene (now a subsidiary of Monsanto) introduced the FlavrSavrTM tomato, the first genetically engineered whole food approved for commercial sale. It was engineered to ripen linger on the vine and still be hard enough to to withstand the processes of picking, packing, and transport. By 1997 it had been withdrawn from the market. Contrary to Calgene's expectations, the tomatoes were often so soft and bruised that they could not be sold as fresh produce and most of the FlavrSavrTM varieties did not have acceptable yields or disease resistance in tomato-growing regions (3).
 
Monsanto's Bt cotton was supposed to be resistant to the bollworm. Instead, up to half of approximately two million acres of Bt cotton planted in the southern United States suffered a heavy infestation and growers were advised to salvage the crop with emergency spraying. In spite of claims that the Bt cotton would be 90 to 95% effective, some cotton consultants repotred that the product was only 60% effective. A legal firm in Texas acting for 17 of the growers claims that Monsanto misrepresented the product (4).
 
Many of the early 'gene dreams' of high yields or increased nitrogen fixation may be unrealistic because they involve complex multigene traits. Nitrogen fixing, for example, depends on at least 17 genes in the bacterium and 50 genes in the plant (5). There are hazards associated with the transfer of a single gene, let alone 50. Even if all the genes required for these traits could actually be identified and transferred, the problems of genetic instability could increase as a result (6). 



6. Genetic Engineering and World Hunger

"(We object) strongly that the image of the poor and hungry from our countries is being used by giant multinational corporations to push a technology that is neither safe, environmentally friendly, nor economically beneficial to us. We do not believe that such companies or gene technologies will help our farmers to produce the food that is needed in the 21st century. On the contrary, we think it will destroy the diversity, the local knowledge and the sustainable agricultural systems that our farmers have developed for millennia and that it will thus undermine our capacity to feed ourselves."

Statement made to the United Nations by delegates from 24 African states backed by 30 development, farmer and environmental organisations
Although increases in population are often used to justify the development of genetic engineering, according to the United Nations' World Food Programme we are currently producing one and a half times the amount of food needed to provide everyone in the world with an adequate and nutritious diet. In spite of this, at least 1 in 7 people in the world are suffering from severe hunger.

Even if genetic engineering was able to deliver its promises of high yielding, disease-resistant crops to the third world, it seems unlikely that this would be of benefit to starving populations because it fails to address the root causes of hunger. Indeed, the suggestion that this complex problem can be solved with a biotechnological panacea allows both governments and industry to distance themselves from their complicity in the political structures and social inequalities that lead to starvation. 

For every £1 that the West is gives in aid to third world countries, £3 is paid back by these same countries as interest on their debt. The UN Development Report in '97 stated that, "In Africa alone, the money spent on annual debt repayments could be used to save the lives of about 21 million children by the year 2000." 
At the height of the 1984 famine in Ethiopia, oilseed rape, linseed, and cottonseed was being grown on prime agricultural land to be exported as feed for livestock to the UK and other European countries. 

"Rather than reducing world hunger, genetic engineering is likely to exacerbate it. Farmers will be caught in a viscious circle, increasingly dependent on a small number of giant multinationals, such as Monsanto, for their survival. For 25 years Action Aid has been listening to poor farmers and supporting their efforts to maintain sustainable farming. Even though the world's population is growing, we know it produces enough food for all - food mountains are evidence of this. It is the inequitable distribution of food that is keeping millions hungry. The truth is that genetically engineered crops will provide a 'better way forward' for Monsanto's profits, but could be a huge step backwards for the world's poor." 

Salil Shetty, chief executive at Action Aid 

In South Korea, following the implementation of the 'Green Revolution', the number of rural households in debt rose from 76% in 1971 to 98% in 1985 (1). In the Punjab, these high costs led to a decline in the number of small farm (2) by nearly a quarter between 1970 and 1980. In India, debt is driving many farmers to suicide. 

Whereas sustainable agricultural systems encourage the use of local resources and help communities to support themselves, multinationals profit by tying farmers to external inputs of seeds, fertilisers or chemicals which come only from them, at their price. It is perhaps for this reason that companies are not keen to acknowledge the potential (3) of any agricultural systems that are outside their control. 

Farm saved seed is the lifeblood for 1.4 billion farming households around the world. Monsanto now owns a patent on a technique dubbed 'terminator technology' that genetically disables a seed so that it is unable to germinate when planted again. 

"This is an immoral technique that robs farming communities of their age-old right to save seed and their role as plant breeders. Farmers and governments everywhere should declare use of the technology as contrary to public order and national security. This is the neutron bomb of agriculture". 

Source: http://archive.greenpeace.org