| Our latest Review brings you news of the battles over GMOs raging around the world. GMO FAILURES
The troubled biotechnology company AquaBounty has announced it will stop production of all genetically modified salmon and is closing its last working facility, at Bay Fortune in Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada. AquaBounty released the worldâs first GM food animal â a GM salmon â onto the market in 2017 but is now culling the last of its fish. The company announced that it does not have sufficient liquidity to maintain its âonly remaining operating farmâ at Bay Fortune and its chief executive officer, David Melbourne, has resigned. Lucy Sharratt, coordinator of the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network, said, âThis struggling company has survived largely due to investor hype along with decades of government funding and the support of the federal policy to deny consumers mandatory labelling of GM food. The company couldnât make producing GM salmon viable even with all the government subsidies and supportive policies.â AquaBountyâs announcement comes just weeks after the Canadian federal and PEI governments announced $231,095 in funding for the company. For background, see this and this. Pakistanâs food exports and imports came to a standstill recently following the Federal Investigation Agencyâs (FIA) action against the Department of Plant Protection (DPP) and the arrest of several officials. The issuance of phytosanitary certificates â mandatory for exporting or importing plants and plant products â has been suspended, effectively halting the movement of goods. These certificates confirm that the consignments are pest- and disease-free. The crackdown follows an inquiry ordered by prime minister Shehbaz Sharif after a consignment of organic basmati rice to the EU earlier this year was found to contain GMOs, violating EU regulations. Director General of DPP Tariq Khan has been suspended. Sources said that around nine officials have been arrested. The suspension of certificates has severely disrupted rice exports. Thereâs background on this story here. Cotton farmers in Nigeria were excited in 2018 when GM cotton seeds were introduced for cultivation, raising hopes of bumper harvests and pest-free cotton regimes. Six years later, however, the introduction of the GM seeds failed to increase the cotton yield per hectare and revive the dying industry. According to Anibe Achimugu, president of the National Cotton Association of Nigeria (NACOTAN), farmers who cultivated the two GM strains did not record any significant increase in yields compared to the local seed varieties â âand it is difficult for farmers to be able to cope due to how expensive it is... when we did a comparison, no farm could get up to four tons per hectare while local seeds produced up to four to five tons per hectare.â GMOs were hyped as the way for farmers to drastically cut pesticide use. But in the most GMO-friendly county in the world, US agriculture uses more than 1.1 billion pounds of pesticides annually (one country â 15% of the global total). And a report from Friends of the Earth shows that just two crops which are overwhelmingly GMO â soy and corn â account for almost half (46%) the volume of all the pesticides used in the US annually. Sustainable practices and innovation using desi (indigenous) cotton has the potential to replace the stagnant GMO Bt cotton grown in 90% of Northern India, according to a farmer and his daughter-in-law in Haryana. They say desi varieties provide high yields and a solution to the challenges posed by pests and climatic unpredictability. In India, writes policy analyst Devinder Sharma, âSomething is going wrong. At a time when India is committed to net-zero emissions by 2070, the policy response should focus on laying out a roadmap for chemical-free farming practices. But it is baffling to find senior officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare hobnobbing instead with industry echelons to see how to permit widespread application of the harmful herbicide, glyphosate, in cotton farming. It does not stop here. Reports say a dedicated committee is also examining the implications of approving the next generation of herbicide-tolerant genetically-modified cotton (HTBt). This comes at a time when the area under Bt cotton â the only approved genetically modified (GM) crop for commercial cultivation in India â has collapsed in Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan. With a decline of 46 per cent in cultivation, the cotton debacle in the northwest regions should have come as an eye-opener. On the contrary, it is bewildering to find that more of the same (in this case with an additional herbicide-tolerant gene) is being pushed as a possible solution.â MEXICO-US TRADE AGREEMENT A tribunal of trade arbitrators has ruled in favour of the United States in its complaint that Mexicoâs restrictions on GM corn violate the terms of the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA), reports Timothy A. Wise. The long-awaited ruling in the 16-month trade dispute is unlikely to settle the questions raised by Mexico about the safety of consuming GM corn and its associated herbicide. Mexicoâs Economy Department said it disagreed with the ruling but said it would abide by it. But Mexicoâs president has reiterated her support for constitutionally enshrining a ban on GM corn growing or use in tortillas. A law already mandates GMO food labelling and, according to Wise, no tortilla seller wants such a label on their products because Mexican consumers are clear they donât want GMOs in their tortillas. Read another good article on the ruling here. More background and links to multiple documents here. Prof Michael Antoniouâs expert submission on the toxicity of GMO corn and the health risks associated with its consumption is here. A scientific analysis prepared by CONAHCYT, Mexicoâs National Council for Humanities, Science and Technology, argues there are unacceptable health risks for Mexican people who consume GM corn and glyphosate, the worldâs most widely used herbicide. The 200-page document with 1,200 references underpins Mexicoâs 2023 decree attempting to restrict the use of GM corn in tortillas and other minimally processed corn products, and to phase out the use of glyphosate. OPPOSITION TO GMOs In a precedent-setting victory for food and environmental safety, a federal district court in the US has ruled that GMOs must be regulated. The Courtâs ruling overturns the 2020 rule overhaul by the first Trump administration that had eliminated most government oversight over GMO crops, trees, and grasses. âThis is a critical victory on behalf of farmers, the planet, and scientific integrity,â said George Kimbrell, legal director for the lead plaintiff Center for Food Safety, and counsel in the case. âUSDA tried to hand over its job to Monsanto and the pesticide industry and the Court held that capitulation contrary to both law and science.â The ruling is a rebuke of the first Trump administrationâs efforts to practically eliminate oversight of novel GMOs and instead let industry self-regulate. For an analysis of the ruling and its implications, see this. A precedent-setting ruling by the South African Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) in favour of African Center for Biosafety (ACB) vs Monsanto/Bayer has set aside the commercial approval of GM drought-tolerant maize. ACB said: âSouth Africa's Supreme Court has agreed that the regulators merely rubber-stamped Monsantoâs application for authorisation, uncritically accepting its paucity of evidence that the GMO poses no threat to human health or the environment and ignoring the contrary expert evidence.â
ENSSER (European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsibility) members Prof Jack Heinemann and Dr Angelika Hilbeck played a crucial role in the court ruling in South Africa (see above). The expert opinions of the two ENSSER members concerned scientific issues listed in the unanimous verdict of the five SCA judges, which triggered the application of the precautionary principle. For example, the Cartagena Protocol requires that claims of scientific certainty be substantiated with evidence to prove a lack of potential for scientific hazards, yet Monsantoâs risk assessment was inadequate in identifying plausible hazards. Also, Monsantoâs claims of lack of allergenicity were unsubstantiated and the allergenicity testing that was done was inadequate. The African Centre for Biodiversity (ACB) has warned that trials of GM wheat in South Africa could contaminate the food supply and find its way into neighbouring importing countries. ACB has registered objections to plans for GM wheat field trials, which it says could lead to below-threshold contamination of wheat products in Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Zambia, and Namibia, none of which have approved GM wheat. The European Parliament has adopted eight resolutions against further import approvals for GM maize and cotton. Most of the plants are resistant to herbicides and some produce insecticidal proteins that were not part of the food chain prior to the introduction of genetic engineering. The European Parliament has used the resolutions to both address the environmental effects in countries where they are cultivated and uncertainties regarding health risks of food and feed produced from the crops. Around 100 different GM crops are already approved for import into the EU. These include soybeans, maize, cotton, oilseed rape and sugar beet, which are often engineered to be resistant to several herbicides. In addition, GM maize, cotton and soybeans may also produce insecticidal toxins. Farmers in Burgundy-Franche-Comté are taking a stand. In November 2024, an impressive convoy of tractors headed to the European Parliament in Strasbourg. The farmers were denouncing EU decisions perceived as threatening to French agriculture. Florian Dirant, president of the Rural Coordination of Haute-Saône, said: âWe want to obtain explanations on measures which, although rejected by the European Parliament, end up being validated by the European Commission.â In the crosshairs is a decision concerning the import of more GMO corn seeds, rejected by MEPs but finally approved by the Commission. The Kenyan High Court has dismissed a case challenging the government's reversal of a ban on genetically modified crops, effectively allowing for their import and open cultivation. The East African nation lifted a decade-long ban on GM crops in 2022 but the decision has been the subject of court challenges and protest from consumer and biodiversity groups. Paul Mwangi, a lawyer who is close to the opposition and the main petitioner in the case, said they were challenging the ruling at the higher Court of Appeal. The Kenyan Peasants League responded to the ruling on X here and here. Kenyan farmers and food sector workers voiced their dissatisfaction with the ruling in video reports here and here. The East African Community partner states have failed to strike consensus on the growing and use of GM crops, with only Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda vouching for the use of GM technology to boost food security and industrial development. In a meeting of the EAC Committee on Agriculture, Tourism and Natural Resources, Tanzania, South Sudan and Burundi declared their opposition to GMOs in the region. The remaining member countries, Democratic Republic of Congo and Somalia, have tended towards opposition too. A coalition of over 100 civil society members, farmers, scientists, legal practitioners, and academics representing 100 million Nigerian consumers have demanded that the Nigerian government discontinue plans to introduce GM potatoes and ban GMOs in the country, stating they violate fundamental human rights and threaten Nigeriaâs food system. This demand followed the announcement that the government will soon release a report on trials of GM potatoes. Similar reports indicate that GM potatoes will be commercially released in 2025. Nigeria stands on a dangerous precipice, writes Mariann Bassey-Orovwuje â a lawyer and Deputy Executive Director at Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth, Nigeria. She writes: âThe National Biosafety Management Agency (NBMA), tasked with safeguarding our nationâs health and environment, has instead become a promoter of GMOs⦠approving virtually every application brought to it without consideration of science-based objections sent by groups of concerned Nigerians.â The Centre for Food Safety and Agriculture Research (CEFSAR) has called for a critical and inclusive dialogue on the future of GMOs. Prof Qrisstuberg Amua, executive director of CEFSAR, proposed a long-term moratorium on the introduction of new GMOs in Nigeria until comprehensive long-term studies can be conducted to fully understand their impacts on health, the environment, trade protections, and food sovereignty. Legal activists from Nigeria and Ghana have called on the governments of both countries to ban GMOs from their nationsâ agricultural systems. The lawyers made the call at a meeting organised by the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) and hosted by Food Sovereignty Ghana (FSG). The lawyers called on the governments of both nations to reject the introduction of GMOs and adhere to the precautionary principle in dealing with biosafety issues. The experts stressed that concerns about GMOs are not only about food, health and environmental safety, but also about the systematic appropriation of the right to seeds by transnational corporations that deprive farmers of their traditional rights, in favour of their patents. In view of Indiaâs Supreme Court recently directing the central government to formulate a national policy on GM crops, farmersâ associations from south India demanded that the government hold democratic consultations as a first step and urged the state government to shun gene technologies in the food and farming sector. Kisan Congress state chairman S. Anvesh Reddy said: âIntroduction of genetic engineering technologies in our food and farming systems is a concern for all citizens... It is about our environment, health, livelihoods and sovereignty. Farmers do not want those technologies and GM crops, both as producers and as consumers. They want a biosafety policy and not a promotional policy for GM crops.â Sustainability expert Kavitha Kuruganti warned that the Ministry of Agriculture, under pressure from industry, may bypass the democratic consultative processes recommended by the Supreme Court. It has already appointed a panel of âexpertsâ to draft the policy, and information about it is being kept secret. In a surprising development, the federal government of Pakistan has allowed the import of GMO soybeans from the United States without conducting risk assessments on 47 gene events in Pakistanâs local conditions, as required by the Cartagena Protocol. This decision effectively changes Pakistan's non-GMO status to GMO, despite previous objections by former prime ministers. The exemption from risk assessments for local conditions appears to have been influenced by powerful industry players, allegedly including a politician from the ruling party. The decision has sparked widespread concerns among civil society and agricultural experts. The Pakistan Poultry Association (PPA) welcomed the government's move to allow the import of GM soybeans (see above). However, the decision was criticised by several business organisations, which expressed concerns about the potential impact on local agriculture and the environment. Several government agencies, including the Ecology Ministry, fiercely opposed the withdrawal of the ban. PATENTS Just two companies â Bayer and Corteva â control the vast majority of patents related to genetically engineered crops. They own just under 80% of these patents, according to US Department of Agriculture research. Bayer and Corteva both own thousands of patents related to seed. With their grip on the industryâs intellectual property, Bayer and Corteva also control the majority of the market for corn and soybeans and large swathes of pesticide markets. Syngenta also owns many corn and soybean patents. The European Patent Office (EPO) has rejected an opposition against a patent held by the company, KWS, on cold-tolerant maize. The international coalition of No Patents on Seeds! filed the opposition because patents on conventionally bred plants and plant varieties are not permitted in Europe.
No Patents on Seeds! has published a report on patents covering conventionally bred plants. Although Europe only permits patents on genetically engineered plants, the European Patent Office (EPO) has granted hundreds of patents on conventionally bred plants, affecting over 1300 European plant varieties. The development threatens to block conventional plant breeding in Europe. âThe EPO and the industry are destroying the basis of European plant breeding by granting these kinds of patents. Access to conventionally bred plant varieties has never been so severely restricted by patents as it is at present,â said Johanna Eckhardt of No Patents on Seeds! Adopted in May 2024 after nearly 25 years of negotiations, the WIPO Treaty on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources, and Traditional Knowledge aims to regulate the use of natural and cultural resources through mandatory disclosure of origin in patent applications. While intended to ensure fair benefit-sharing, loopholes in the disclosure requirements allow circumvention, raising concerns about the potential legitimisation of biopiracy. AstraZeneca has said it may cut jobs at its UK operation if the government enforces a global push to make companies share profits derived from natureâs genetic codes. RESEARCH
A diet containing GM soybean oil damaged the liver and kidney of rats in a 90-day feeding study. The study provides further proof that GM soy is not substantially equivalent to non-GM soy, meaning that regulatory authorisations given on the assumption of equivalence are invalid. The study was conducted on male rats in three groups. One group was fed a diet containing 10% GM soybean oil for 90 days, while the other two groups served as control groups, receiving either non-GM soybean oil or a standard lab diet, respectively. The scientists carried out biochemical analysis of the blood and microscopic tissue analysis (histopathology) of the liver and kidneys. GM soybean oil caused histological abnormalities in the liver, including congestion, necrosis, and bile duct hyperplasia (increased cell production, which may indicate a pre-cancerous state). Similarly, congestion, haemorrhage, and glomerulosclerosis (scarring of small blood vessels) were found in the kidney analysis. Moreover, GM soybean oil significantly increased gamma-glutamyl transferase (a possible sign of liver disease or damage) and insulin (often associated with type 2 diabetes) levels compared to a standard diet. REGULATORY FAILURES Indiaâs Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change has amended the rules governing the selection of experts to the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC), the technical body regulating GM seeds in India. Under the new rules, an âexpert memberâ has to disclose any âinterestâ that could conflict with their duties. The expert is also expected to take all steps necessary to ensure that any conflict of interest does not affect any decision of the GEAC. All selected members would also have to fill out a form detailing their professional affiliations to a decade prior to joining the committee. However, GMWatch cautions that it is not enough to have experts in committees responsible for decision making on GMOs declare their conflicts of interest; steps must be taken to exclude such conflicted people altogether from the committees. They can still be invited to give evidence or comments, as with any stakeholder. MON810 maize is the only transgenic GM plant authorised for commercial cultivation in the European Union. This authorisation was initially granted, via France, almost 30 years ago, in 1998, for an initial period of 10 years. A renewal application was submitted in 2007. Since then, no decision has been taken by the European authorities. How can this maize, for which the authorisation theoretically expired in 2008, still be grown legally in Europe? Simply because EU law accepts that, as long as the European Commission has not responded to a request for renewal, the initial authorisation remains valid. The Commission has failed to respond to Bayer/Monsantoâs request for the past 15 years. GMO TRIALS In Norway, the Institute of Marine Research (IMR) has filed a trial application, in 2023, for GM VIRGIN® salmon. These salmon, bred in cages in the open sea, would be sterile to prevent them from interbreeding with wild populations in the event of accidental dissemination. However, sterile fish cannot reproduce. This first manipulation would have to be repeated for each generation⦠hence the idea of using a complementary method that would allow some fish to be fertile, while retaining the initial genetic modification (sterility): a sort of temporary, non-inherited fertility rescue that would allow the sterile trait to be passed on. The Norwegian Environment Agency asked the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food and the Environment (VKM) to assess the associated environmental risks. VKMâs opinion was highly critical, stating that there was insufficient evidence to consider the trial safe. In April 2024, after having considered new data, VKM reiterated its negative opinion. CORPORATE CRIMES For five years, GM cotton was planted in an illegal area in Mato Grosso state, Brazil, openly disregarding a biosafety measure created by the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply (MAPA). Until early May 2024, GM cotton plantations were banned from 31 municipalities in Mato Grosso, in an area considered an exclusion zone under Ministry of Agriculture Ordinance 437. The protection, lifted with strong support from Embrapa, a government corporation that holds GM cotton patents, was aimed at preventing contamination of native cotton, a natural seed used by family farmers as well as Indigenous communities. SUSTAINABILITY Everybody talks about âsustainabilityâ these days â but what does that actually mean? As the concept of âsustainabilityâ has inched up the political agenda, the way we define it has become distorted and compromised. Today many of our ideas about sustainability â sometimes even those espoused by environmentalists â are more about political expediency, corporate interests and market creation than rooted in sustaining life on Earth. A report from A Bigger Conversation - Rethinking Sustainability â Life-centric Agriculture in a Techno-centric World â argues that today, the concept of sustainability has become over-focussed on political expediency, corporate interests and market creation. A new report from CAFOD (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development) debunks some of the myths spread by agribusiness and reminds us that agroecology, small farmers and local markets are at the heart of sustainable and just food systems. The four myths that are demolished are:
* âIntensive industrial agriculture is always more efficient than the alternativesâ
* âAgroecology canât feed the world so there is no alternative to corporate agricultureâ
* âLocal farmers need global markets to escape povertyâ
* âWe need cheap food to feed poor peopleâ. GM INSECTS Oxitec, a UK-based biotech corporation specialising in genetically engineered insects, has submitted an application to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the approval to commercially sell GMO mosquitoes directly to consumers across every state in America. In 2021, after years of public resistance, Oxitec was given the green light by the EPA, the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS), and the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District (FKMCD) to conduct an uncontrolled experimental release of their GMO Aedes aegypti mosquitoes in the Florida Keys. The mosquitoes are categorised as a âbiopesticideâ. Oxitec has also applied for commercial release of its GM mosquitoes in Australia, with a consultation in April. The claimed goal is to reduce dengue fever. The application says, âEggs of the GM mosquitoes would be packed into mosquito rearing boxes and would be available for sale to pest control professionals, businesses and the general public in Queensland.â GeneEthics comments that the local Wolbachia programme (a non-GM approach) already reduced acquired dengue fever to zero in 2022 and â23. Toxic male mosquitoes will poison females with their semen in a new population control method developed by Australian researchers. The method involves genetically engineering males to produce spider and sea anemone venom proteins, which they inject into females during mating, reducing their lifespan. See a research paper here. GeneEthics comments: âAn ideal solution would be to control the insects without eradicating them, given that mosquitoes are pollinators and an important food source for fish and bats.â HUMAN GENETICS A little-noticed change to South Africaâs national health research guidelines, published in May this year, has put the country on an ethical precipice. The newly added language appears to position the country as the first to explicitly permit the use of genome editing to create genetically modified children. Heritable human genome editing has long been hotly contested, in large part because of its societal and eugenic implications. In 2018 the media reported on a Chinese scientist who had created the worldâs first gene-edited babies using CRISPR technology. In the aftermath, the organising committee of the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing joined the global uproar with a statement condemning this research. At the same time, however, the committee called for a âresponsible translational pathwayâ toward clinical research. Safety thresholds and âadditional criteriaâ would have to be met, including âindependent oversight, a compelling medical need, an absence of reasonable alternatives, a plan for long-term follow-up, and attention to societal effectsâ. Notably, the additional criteria no longer included the earlier standard of âbroad societal consensusâ. More than 20 years after the Human Genome Project was completed, the promise of personal genetics hasnât panned out for the average person. âGenetics was supposed to be this thing that unlocked all this information and cured disease. It ended up being way more complicated than that,â says Christina Farr, a health tech investor and former journalist who covered the genetic testing company 23andMe for many years. In August, 23andMe shuttered its in-house drug discovery unit and now the company is in trouble, as home DNA testing has lost its lustre. Valued at $6 billion when it went public in 2021, 23andMeâs stock has plummeted and it has never made a profit in the 18 years since it was founded. Outgoing US president Joe Biden is set to transfer control of a vast DNA database to the next administration, raising concerns about privacy, security, and civil rights under Trumpâs potential use of the programme. Insurers are refusing to cover Americans whose DNA reveals health risks. Itâs perfectly legal. .................................................................. We hope you’ve found this newsletter useful. Please support our work with a one-off or regular donation. Thank you! |
