To GM or not to GM?

Genetic engineering is seen by some as a sort of bogeyman and for others it is the “best thing since sliced bread”. Crops and other foods are modified at a genetic level in labs to improve characteristics or to give them new desired ones.

As an example a type of rice in Asia was genetically engineered, or modified, with genes from carrots to give a golden coloured rice that had a high Vitamin A content. It was done because the population of Asia generally has a low vitamin A intake, so by adding it into rice, which is the most widely eaten food in that region, the people were getting a regular dosage of this important nutrient and the widespread deficiency was significantly reduced.

The negative side of GE (or GM) is that we don’t know the long term effects of this type of manipulation, we may be creating food allergies where there were none, some of these GM species are bred so that they will not produce seeds which means that farmers have to buy fresh seeds each time, and then there is the problem of the spread of GM crops in to places where they should not be.

It is this last effect that is causing the greatest concern as the patent for GM crops is often owned by large corporations and they obviously want to sell the seeds rather than give them away. The research and development of these GM foods is long and expensive, so giving the crop away does not make good business sense.
The problem is that with insects, the wind and other environmental impacts, GM crops can easily end up in places where they should not be and a farmer may be getting the benefit of that crop without paying for it. This has resulted in massive court cases.
So it is really no surprise that there has now been a second case under investigation by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) for unauthorised GM wheat growing. In the first investigation, the authorities have not been able to find out how the non authorised crop ended up in the facility where it was found.

In both investigations the discoveries were made at test facility sites, where field trials had previously been conducted.
It is now a moral as well as legal dilemma about who actually owns an unauthorised genetically engineered crop – is it the farmer on whose land the crop has ended or is it the corporation that owns the patent on the GM?

It is an issue that urgently needs to be determined, with clear guidelines established to give us all direction. Right now it is an example of science moving faster than the law. However, if it is not sorted out soon, there is the very real potential that foods we all love and eat daily will not be able to be grown unless the farmer pays a significant premium to the owner of the patent on that crop.

Written by Rachelle Williams, The Green Food Safety Coach.