Author: GMO Pundit

India and GM food: Without modification
• A setback for GM in India

The Economist [UK], 11 February 2010 :
…The moratorium is a victory for what has become India’s first nationwide anti-GM movement. After the GEAC judgment, consumers, medical groups, farmers and state governments mobilised at once to campaign against Bt Brinjal. Hindu-nationalist and Communist politicians rallied to the unmodified brinjal’s cause. Anti-GM groups cried foul over India’s lack of an independent biosafety regulator. They also argued that the guidelines for trials of GM foods are flawed and that studies revealing more about the long-term health dangers had been ignored…. more at link

India and GM food: Without modification | The Economist

 The anti-GM lobby stalwarts:

17.I have received a number of emails from scientists in the USA, France, Australia, UK and New Zealand raising very serious doubts on Bt-brinjal and also on the way tests have been conducted in India . Amongst them, I should mention communications received from (i) Professor G.E. Séralini from France who in a detailed report has pointed out several flaws in the EC-II report and concludes that “the risk on human and mammalian health is too high for authorities to take the decision to commercialise this GM brinjal”; (ii) Dr. Doug Gurain-Sherman of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Washington DC which says that “the record compiled over a 13-year period shows that the 4% yield enhancement contributed by Bt-corn varieties constitutes only 14% of overall corn yield increase. Further, Dr. Gurain-Sherman highlights serious flaws in the EC-II report on evaluation of gene flow risks from Bt-brinjal; (iii) Professor Allison Snow and Professor Norman Ellstrand of the Ohio State University that identifies several shortcomings in the EC-II report concerning gene flow from Bt-brinjal to wild and weedy relatives; (iv) Dr. Nicholas Storer of Dow AgroSciences (a private US company much like Monsanto)who does say that Bt-brinjal does not pose unreasonable adverse risks to the environment or to human and animal health but who calls for careful implementation of resistance management strategies and points out that Bt-technology should not be seen as a silver bullet to managing lepidopteran pests in brinjal; (v) Dr. Jack Heinemann of the University of Canterbury, New Zealand who questions the consistent yield increases claimed for Bt-cotton and says that the Bt-brinjal tests conducted in India would not meet careful international standards; (vi) Dr. David Andow of the University of Minnesota, USA who says that his reading of the EC-II report is sufficient to lead him to question the adequacy of environmental risk assessment but it is not sufficient for him to conclude that the environmental risk assessment is erroneous; and (vii)Dr. David Schubert of the Salk Institute of Biological Studies, USA who says that Bt-brinjal should definitely not be introduced in India since it poses serious environmental and health risks, will increase social and political dependence on private companies and will entail higher costs at all levels of the food chain; and (viii) Dr. Judy Carman of the Institute of Health and Environmental Research, South Australia who has analysed Mahyco’s biosafety dossier of 2008 in great detail and who says that her doubts and questions have not been answered at all in the EC-II report.

The Hindu : News / National : Bt Brinjal: Note by Ministry of Environment and Forests

GM Debate Hijacked by Bias
– Bill Crabtree (Agricultural Scientist and Morawa Farmer), Countryman (Western Australia), February 3, 2010

I would like to challenge several assertions that former agriculture minister Kim Chance made on genetically modified crops in the media recently. Those who know nothing of the science of genes could be alarmed by Mr Chance’s comments. Mr Chance says consumers do not want, and will not consume GM foods. GM canola oil is not protein. So, GM canola oil has no modified genes in it. For the past 15 years most of us have been eating fish and chips cooked in Australian cottonseed oil produced from GM cotton. Most pork and poultry and some beef and sheep meats grown in WA, and eaten by our families are from animals fed GM soy meal imported from America.

Mr Chance says there is no evidence of the benefits to consumers of GM foods. GM crops are cheaper to grow, and the resulting lower prices do benefit consumers. In addition, the average city person does not fully appreciate that GM is the most environmentally friendly way of producing food. GM crops and no-tillage have taken modern agriculture a long way toward a sustainable future. GM crops can be grown with less herbicide, more stubble, or mulch retention, less insecticide, less fuel, less carbon emissions, less soil erosion and can convert scarce water supplies into food. If consumers are concerned about the environment and the cost of food they have no logical choice but to applaud the benefits of GM technology. The use of GM cotton has seen a dramatic reduction in pesticide use and GM canola will remove our over reliance on the globally banned herbicide atrazine.

Mr Chance says 90 per cent of the 400 submissions to the GM Crops Free Act review were against GM. What he failed to point out is many of these letters were pro forma and most did not address the issues raised in the State Government review and were therefore correctly ignored.

WAFarmers and the Pastoralists and Graziers Association, representing the State’s farming community, submitted one application each asking the ban to be lifted. Mr Chance argues WA is one of the last dependable sources of non-GM canola, so we should stay that way. Two years of GM canola cultivation in the eastern states show segregation is possible. WA’s trials also confirmed this. Mr Chance says there is strong demand from the market for GM-free. The Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics shows consistently that there is no market premium for non-GM canola.

The primary reason for last year’s trials was to test segregation, which proved successful. But the trials showed a 15 per cent, or 200 kg/ha yield increase with GM canola over non-GM triazine-tolerant canola. With canola currently achieving $400 per tonne this is $80 per hectare more, and for some farmers this may be all the profit there is in some years.

Mr Chance says the European Union will not allow GM foods. The EU has been importing Canadian canola oil derived from GM canola through the United Arab Emirates and China for about five years and has been consuming it safely. GM corn is grown in some EU countries, and the EU imports GM corn and GM soybeans.

Mr Chance warns GM companies are pushing their own agenda and are not allowing testing of their products. GM companies do allow testing of their products. There are hundreds of papers in the scientific community carried out by highly regarded authors worldwide looking at everything from agronomic performance to fitness for consumption.

I am not against GM technology, Mr Chance says. But the former politician’s track record of press releases, door stop interviews, news conferences show he is ideologically opposed to GM. Indeed the laws he introduced in 2003 imposed a fine of $200,000 on any WA farmer using the technology.

Indee, Mr Chance repeatedly refused to travel to Canada to see the technology for himself. Except on the radical fringe, Canadian growers and consumers have no negative issues with GM canola and recognise it as an outstanding success story. In the early 1990s Australia grew about 1.7 million tonnes of canola while Canada grew about 2.5 million tonnes. Since the advent of Canadian GM canola in 1996, when I lived there, canola production has quadrupled to over 10 million tonnes and Australia has not even maintained its status quo.

Canadian farmers are not foolish and they have made the choice to grow 90 per cent of their canola as GM while still growing 10 per cent as non-GM. In conjunction with no-till, GM technology, once it becomes legal, will enable us to produce food in dryland agriculture in the most sustainable way currently known to man.

Given the impossible corner Chance has painted himself into, it is understandable that he’d be reluctant to admit his monumental misjudgment for fear of exposing himself as an emperor with no clothes. But by maintaining the pretence that there is something to fear from GM crops, he will make himself look even sillier and more intellectually disreputable than he already is.

European Food Safety Authority Analyzes and Dismisses the new Seralini Paper

GMO Panel deliberations on the paper by de Vendômois et al. (2009, A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health, International Journal of Biological Sciences, 5: 706-726) – EFSA/GMO/578 – part of the Minutes 55th Plenary Meeting of the GMO Panel Adopted part of the minutes1 of the 55th plenary meeting of the Scientific Panel on Genetically Modified Organisms held on 27-28 January 2010 to be published at http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/events/event/gmo100127.htm

The EFSA GMO Panel has considered the paper by de Vendômois et al. (2009, A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health, International Journal of Biological Sciences, 5: 706-726), a statistical reanalysis of data from three 90-day rat feeding studies already assessed by the GMO Panel (EFSA, 2003a,b; EFSA 2004a,b; EFSA 2009b,c). The GMO Panel concludes that the authors’ claims, regarding new side effects indicating kidney and liver toxicity, are not supported by the data provided in their paper. There is no new information that would lead it to reconsider its previous opinions on the three maize events MON810, MON863 and NK603, which concluded that there were no indications of adverse effects for human, animal health and the environment.

The GMO Panel notes that several of its fundamental statistical criticisms (EFSA, 2007a,b) of the authors’ earlier study (Seralini et al., 2007) of maize MON863 are also applicable to the new paper by de Vendômois et al. In the GMO Panel’s extensive evaluation of Seralini et al. (2007), reasons for the apparent excess of significant differences found for MON863 (8%) were given and it was shown that this raised no safety concerns. The percentage of variables tested reported by de Vendômois et al. that were significant for NK603 (9%) and MON810 (6%) were of similar magnitude to that for MON863.

The GMO Panel considers that de Vendômois et al.:
(1) make erroneous statements concerning the use of reference varieties to provide estimates of variability that allow equivalence testing to place statistically significant results into biological context as advocated by EFSA (2008, 2009a);
(2) do not use the available information concerning normal background variability between animals fed with different diets, to place observed differences into biological context;
(3) do not present results using their False Discovery Rate methodology in a meaningful way;
(4) give no evidence to relate well known gender differences in response to diet to claims of effects due to the respective GMOs; (5) estimate statistical power based on inappropriate analyses and magnitudes of difference.

The significant differences highlighted by de Vendômois et al. have all been considered previously by the GMO Panel in its previous opinions on the three maize events MON810, MON863 and NK603. The study by de Vendômois et al. provides no new evidence of toxic effects. The approach used by de Vendômois et al. does not allow a proper assessment of the differences claimed between the GMOs and their respective counterparts for their toxicological relevance because:

(1) results are presented exclusively in the form of percentage differences for each variable, rather than in their actual measured units;
(2) the calculated values of the toxicological parameters tested are not related to the normal range for the species concerned;
(3) the calculated values of the toxicological parameters tested are not compared with ranges of variation found in test animals fed with diets containing different reference varieties;
(4) the statistically significant differences did not show consistency patterns over endpoint variables and doses;
(5) the inconsistencies between the purely statistical arguments of de Vendômois et al., and the results for these three animal feeding studies which relate to organ pathology, histopathology and histochemistry, are not addressed.

Regarding claims made by de Vendômois et al. concerning the inadequacy of the experimental design of these three animal feeding studies, the GMO Panel notes that they were all carried out to agreed internationally-defined standards consistent with OECD protocols.

Scientists, Donors Blast Ethiopia’s Bio Safety Law

Peter Heinlein, Voice of America, Addis Ababa 04 February 2010

Scientists and farmers are urging Ethiopia to reconsider a new biodiversity law they say restricts agricultural research and could hamper delivery of urgently needed food aid. The law has prompted foreign donors to cut off funding to Ethiopian scientific research institutions.
Ethiopia’s government held a two day forum this week to hear objections to a Biodiversity Proclamation approved by parliament last July, on the final day before summer recess. The law’s stated objective is to protect biodiversity, as well as human health and animals, from ‘the adverse effects of modified organisms’.  
But critics say the proclamation chokes off research into improving crop production in a country suffering chronic food shortages. Tilaye Feyisa, assistant professor of plant biotechnology at Addis Ababa University says anyone involved in studying genetic engineering is subject to strict government regulation.
"It is really excellent proclamation to prevent the research in the areas of plant genetic engineering," said Tilaye Feyisa. "It stops, because if you break this proclamation, even unintentionally, you can be put in prison for one to three years."
Tilaye says funding for research on genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, has dried up since the law went into effect.
"The money we get is from outside sources," said Tilaye. "We write proposals, when the country is against GMOs, having this proclamation, we don’t get any money for research from foreign donors. It is killing the scientific research."
Tilahun Zewelde is a former plant scientist at the Ethiopian Research Organization. He now work at Uganda’s Agriculture Biotechnology Support Program. Speaking at this week’s meeting, he charged Ethiopia’s law was written by environmental extremists and adopted without review by a parliament that had no idea of its consequences.
"We can’t even teach students life science and biotechnology," said Tilahun Zewelde. "And the main reason it was  drafted by very biased people. Biased in the sense biotechnology is bad, genetic engineering is bad and multinationals are going to take over everything, control the seed business. And the actual technology users were not involved in drafting process. So it’s one sided, not good for country."
Biotechnology experts from other African nations came to the forum to express concerns about the Biosafety Proclamation. Togolese scientist Jacob Mignouna is Technical Director of the African Agricultural Technology Foundation. He says the law rejects conclusive evidence about the safety of genetically modified organisms in common use.
"There’s no need to reinvent the wheel," said Jacob Mignouna. "The world has moved on. This technology has been proven. This is the message our colleagues from Ethiopia should understand and look carefully and see how we can move forward to embrace new technology at the same time protecting biodiversity in this great country."
But Minister of State for Agricultural Development Abera Deresa says Ethiopia is not convinced by available evidence that GMOs are safe. The Agriculture Ministry was a main sponsor of the forum, but Abera says the government has a duty to protect the public until the scientific community does more to prove GMOs pose no threat to health or to Ethiopia’s biodiversity.
"Among scientists there is a division," said Abera Deresa. "A certain number of scientists who are not for GMO, a certain number of scientists who are for GMO.  So we have to assess why this is happening."
Abera says the government is reviewing the Biosafety Proclamation, and may ask parliament to make changes.
Meanwhile, aid donors say the law could restrict shipments of food intended for more than five million Ethiopians facing malnutrition.
The United States provides nearly 80 per cent of Ethiopia’s food assistance.
Among the U.S. supplies currently on the way is roughly 30,000 metric tons of corn-soy blend and vegetable oil, which are typically produced from bioengineered corn and soy.
The Ethiopian government has issued a waiver to allow the products to come in to the country, but the waiver is due to expire at the end of February.

Pundit’s thoughts;

Very, very sad. Lets hope this changes before people die unnecessarily.

Scientists, Donors Blast Ethiopia’s Bio Safety Law | Environment | English

GMO’s, Italy: an ethical label to help consumers
by S. C.

The Minister of agricultural food and forestry re-addresses the Gmo issue, launching the idea of an ethical label that guarantees both the consumers and the producers adverse to Gmo products…

…”I ask the supporters of the Frankenstein’s revolution, Zaia declares, if the Italian products abroad are more known for their differences, and therefore for the biodiversity that is at its base, or for the homologation. And I ask if a process that irreversibly would make us equal to all the Countries that do not have quality agriculture would enable us, also from the economic point of view, to help our agricultural enterprises. I want to underline that Gmo’s are not the answer to a market where ours foods are confronted with those sold at very low prices because produced in Countries that pay their labourers two euro per day, like India, or five euro per day, like China. The answer to these problems is serious policy that impose traceability and labelling of the agrifood products”.

Source: Agricoltura italiana on line
by S. C.
03 February 2010 Teatro Naturale International n. 2 Year 2

Pundit’s thought’s:

Ethical, Smethical.

Unscaring Not as Easy as Scaring

February 3rd, 2010

A Wall Street Journal article about The Lancet’s retraction of Dr. Wakefield’s spurious 1998 paper linking vaccines to autism quotes ACSH Advisor and chief of infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Dr. Paul Offit, who said, “This retraction by The Lancet came far too late. It’s very easy to scare people; it’s very hard to unscare them.”

“That was our reaction as well,” says Dr. Whelan. “We’re bothered by media coverage given to this retraction. They act as if this article was printed last week. The misleading and unscientific article in question was published twelve years ago, and The Lancet never apologized for it. They didn’t even retract it of their own volition; they waited until the General Medical Council condemned it. And despite the fact that it was retracted, we have a quote in the Wall Street Journal from the president of the National Autism Association saying it’s still possible that the MMR vaccine causes autism.”

“Even now, Lancet editor Richard Horton fails to accept responsibility for the human toll he allowed by publishing the Wakefield ‘study’ in 1998,” says Dr. Ross. “The study — even without the then-unknown ethical failings — was a terribly unscientific piece of garbage, based on twelve children and using a ‘novel’ theory of causation and flimsy ‘evidence.’ Even when ten of the original thirteen authors withdrew their names, Horton declined to either withdraw the article or accept his own guilt for the ravages of preventable childhood diseases following the havoc he allowed to occur.

“Ironically, the anti-vaccine hysteria against MMR vaccine spurred by Wakefield and The Lancet morphed into anti-thimerosal hysteria. Thimerosal is a mercury-containing preservative, now banished from vaccines due to this baseless fear. Yet, MMR never contained thimerosal — the scapegoat in these superstitious attacks seems to vary depending which side of the ocean you’re on.”

“The overarching lesson here is critical,” says ACSH’s Jeff Stier. “When a widely respected medical journal publishes a scare story, the scare still may be unfounded. It may take years for the record to be corrected, and the consequences of the precautionary principle could be deadly.”

From BPA, Lancet Lateness, Harm Reduction, Salt Reduction

By Curtis Porter, in ACSH Dispatch

See also

FEBRUARY 3, 2010.British Medical Journal Retracts Autism Study ..

By SHIRLEY S. WANG, WSJ

The study that first suggested a link between vaccines and autism and spurred a long-running, acrimonious debate over the safety of vaccines has been retracted by the British medical journal that published it…

…”Many consumer groups have spent 10 years waging a campaign against vaccines even in the face of scientific evidence,” said Dr. Horton of the Lancet. “We didn’t have the evidence back in 2004 to fully retract the paper but we did have enough concern to persuade the authors to partly retract the paper.”

Dr. Horton said the journal was particularly concerned about the ethical treatment of the children in the study, and that the children had been “cherry-picked” by the study’s authors rather than just showing up in the hospital, as described in the paper.

Update

WSJ Media center video

The Pundit’s opinions:

Horton’s misjudgments on MMR vaccine led to a decade of harm. His actions on the infamous Pusztai GM-potato paper were totally his responsibility, and continue to do harm after a decade of un-necessary delay.

See Pusztai details at an earlier Pundit posting:

Rats fed bad diets have lots of changes in their guts.

Recent Pundit posts have covered claims by Gilles-Eric Séralini and coworkers who went searching among hundreds of observations for a few  that fit with their own preconceptions. This work started as a Greenpeace funded analysis of earlier GM food safety assessments. American creationists are now describing this approach as "dispassionate", and they are lauding published results because fit with their creationist convictions.

The Pundit sees a common theme of a search for justification of what is already believed, rather than careful checking of tentative new conjectures to see if they are false. In the latest Séralini paper referred to in the article below

( Spiroux de Vendomois J, Roullier F, Cellier D and Séralini G-E, A Comparison of the Effects of Three GM Corn Varieties on Mammalian Health.Int J Biol Sci2009;5(7):706-726) there is active avoidance of  EFSA reports that show the Séralini approach yields false results.

A warning flag on such questionable claims is use of adjectives such as "dispassionate" and "independent" in press releases and news articles to imply greater credibility for a favoured spokes-person. Its much sounder science to let the evidence and logic speak for itself: in the de Vendomois paper it says false discovery is a real problem here.

CREATIONISM EXAMINER

GMO debate explodes in American media

Terry Hurlbut

25.1.10

The debate on whether genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are fit for human consumption exploded over the weekend, with multiple reports appearing in the popular press quoting some of the first "dispassionate" studies suggesting that GMOs are in fact dangerous. But what very few commentators realize is that the debate, such as it is, is confined only to those who believe in materialistic evolution. No creationist would have approved of any of the GMO projects under discussion.

The most important, if not the sole, purveyor of GMO foodstuffs is a company called Monsanto. Late last year, four French scientists released this paper describing their study of three Monsanto GM corn strains. They fed corn from these strains to rats, and found clear signs that their livers and kidneys, and perhaps also their hearts, adrenal glands, spleens, and bone marrow were noticeably injured from repeated feedings. This should have surprised no one. As the French paper reveals, one of the strains is designed to be hardy enough to grow in a field sprayed with a weed killer (and would therefore be likely to contain residual amounts of that weed killer), while the other two are designed to make their own insecticide. This is what Monsanto, Inc. proposes that human beings eat–though one account alleges that at least some of Monsanto’s own employees refuse to eat their own products.

The French study did not receive much circulation at first, perhaps because Europeans have never felt comfortable with GM foods, and this study would have told them nothing that they did not already suspect. The American situation is quite different. Until now, the loudest opposition to GM foods has come from movements best described as neo-Luddite in character, with a rare contribution from alternative-medicine advocates who are, sadly, obscure. But last Saturday evening, an article appeared in Discovery News citing the French study and an independent review of it. And today this article appeared in The Record-Bee (Lake County, California) advising readers to raise their voices at a County Supervisors’ meeting scheduled for this evening, and insist on a ban of GM foods from that county.

Controversies like this happen only because too many people have accepted a totally materialistic view of the origins of life. Under that view, humans and the foods they eat have their particular form by accident. From that mindset follows another: that the foods that humans eat have room for improvement in their basic make-up, and that man is smart enough to do the improving.

Not all materialists think this way. Joseph R. Mercola, for example, believes that one does not tinker with a food chain that has stood the test of (deep) time. He recommends foods "grown" or raised in conditions as close to "wild" as possible–not because he’s an instinctive machine-breaker, like the legendary Ned Ludd, but because he believes that mankind simply did not "evolve" to process farm-raised foods (especially cereal grains, which he never eats) properly, and no one should be arrogant enough to believe that he can improve on eons of "evolution."

Creation-oriented diet advisers, like Jordan Rubin (The Maker’s Diet) and George Malkmus (The Hallelujah Diet), are not afraid of agriculture, but neither would they tolerate GM foods. They point out that many of the problems that GM foods are intended to solve, are the result of thoroughly unsound (and unbiblical) farming practices, like growing one single crop year after year, instead of rotating crops and even allowing land to lie fallow once every seven years, to regain its strength. They also point out another obvious consideration: when God made both man and his food, He made them perfectly suitable for one another, and any attempt to improve on either design would fall short of Divine perfection. In other words, one does not tinker with the Work of the Master.

NEW STATESMAN

Whole Earth Discipline: an Ecopragmatist Manifesto – Stewart Brand

Reviewed by Becky Hogge

20th January 2010

Round the world trip

…Whole Earth Discipline: an Ecopragmatist Manifesto is a rich, compelling guide to how old wisdom can combine with new technologies to help civilisation survive man-made climate change. But it should be read as much for its dissection of the way ideologies distort decision-making on science and technology. Why, for example, did the anti-statist right oppose fluoridation and the anti-corporate left oppose genetically modified crops? “A political agenda is . . . poor at solving problems,” writes Brand. “Accustomed to saving natural systems from civilisation, Greens now have the unfamiliar task of saving civilisation from a natural system.” The ensuing ideological backflip will spread its own kind of chaos – a chaos budding ecopragmatists must learn to sidestep.

The book proposes three ideological heresies about to break on the shores of environmental consciousness. These concern urbanisation, GMcrops and nuclear power. The earth’s population became mostly urban in 2007. The dream of going back to the land – an ideal that Brand won fame for promoting in The Whole Earth Catalogue, a kind of Sears for hippie communes – is wrong-headed, because cities turn out to be the green option.

Urbanisation slows population growth (as more women choose education and opportunity over large families), concentrates resource needs and gradually empties rural areas of subsistence farmers, allowing planned approaches to agriculture that reduce environmental impact and leave room for “natural” ecosystems that will mitigate climate harm…

Whole Earth Discipline: an Ecopragmatist Manifesto

Stewart Brand Atlantic Books, 336pp, £19.99

From the comments

David, thanks for posting this review of Stuart Brand’s book. I’ve been a follower of Brand’s The Long Now Foundation for many years, and I think this is one of the most important books of recent times (along with Parlberg’s brilliant Starved for Science and Ronald and Adamchak’s Tomorrow’s Table), as it begins
the process of uncoupling fundamental idealism about what is best for the ‘environment’ with what is actually going to make a difference to improving the natural and human worlds. As in all cases, there is a great disconnect between the goals of what we could do if we started this whole human endeavour afresh
(which is how many of the environmental NGOs operate), and what we can do to make a real difference here and now based on the looming environmental and human catastrophes of rapid climate change. As Brand summarises brilliantly in the book, everything in life is a comparison of risk and reward, yet this is so
commonly overlooked in the polarised arguments of both the anti and pro GM lobby groups. Thank you again for such a great resource as GMO Pundit, and I encourage
your readers to go and read this book!

Irish Government attempts to gag GM research: issue raised in Irish Parliament

WEDNESDAY 27 Jan 10

Govt attempt to gag Teagasc raised in Dáil – Creed
http://www.finegael.org/news/a/2164/article

Fine Gael Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Spokesperson Michael Creed TD has accused the Govt of refusing to answer questions about a reported reprimand sent to Teagasc on the subject of Ireland’s GM-free policy. Speaking during Dáil Questions today (Wednesday), Deputy Creed has demanded that the Government publish any such letter sent to the State’s agri-food research body.

Fine Gael Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Spokesperson Michael Creed TD has accused the Govt of refusing to answer questions about a reported reprimand sent to Teagasc on the subject of Ireland’s GM-free policy. Speaking during Dáil Questions today (Wednesday), Deputy Creed has demanded that the Government publish any such letter sent to the State’s agri-food research body.

"The FF/Green Government likes to bang on ad nauseum about the `smart’ economy, but reports of this letter suggest it would rather its expert bodies were dumb.

"It appears a letter was sent from the Department of Agriculture criticising Teagasc researchers involved in a study on GM feed. This is a sinister development. What scientific research will the Agriculture Ministry seek to stifle next if it treads on Green toes? Which scientific body will be subjected to a Government gag next if its research happens to undermine the programme for government? The Minister has, in a most disingenuous fashion, refused to answer direct questions from me today when he should undertake to publish this letter in full.

"The study undertaken by Teagasc researchers concerned the impact of a GM feed ban on the Irish pig industry. The results suggest that replacing GM feed with non-GM feed would increase the production cost per pig by between €2.51 and €3.93 and cost the industry up to €13.8 million annually. The conclusion to be drawn is that the Irish pig industry would not survive in the GM-free environment envisaged in the programme for government and foisted upon us by the Greens’ presence at the cabinet table.

"Instead of spending his time writing to criticise the experts at his disposal the Minister would do better to heed the warnings in this study and embrace scientific evidence to avoid the destruction of the pig meat sector."

Australian plant researchers get IBM boost  | The Australian Jan 28th 2010

LOCAL plant researchers could more than halve the time taken to produce smarter food crops by using state-of-the art technology.

Researchers at the Australian Plant Phenomics Facility’s new Plant Accelerator centre will rely on storage and computing grunt from IBM to hasten the process of field work.
Launched yesterday at the University of Adelaide’s Waite campus, the Plant Accelerator simulates real-world conditions to grow plants in four ‘smart’ glass houses…continued at link

Australian plant researchers get IBM boost | The Australian

Mon 25 January, 2010 GM choice for WA canola growers

Portfolio: Premier, Agriculture and Food

The State Government today announced genetically modified (GM) canola could from this year onwards be grown in Western Australia. Agriculture and Food Minister Terry Redman has approved an exemption order under the Genetically Modified Crops Free Areas Act 2003 to permit the cultivation of GM canola, which will offer growers added choice in their cropping systems.

Premier Colin Barnett said giving farmers access to GM canola fulfilled a key election promise to allow planting of GM cotton in the Ord Irrigation Scheme and the approval of commercial-size trials of canola. “This decision brings WA in line with the other major grain-growing States, New South Wales and Victoria, where growers have been able to grow GM canola commercially since 2008,” Mr Barnett said. “WA farmers are some of the best in the world, but they need to have access to new technology like GM canola to remain competitive in the global marketplace.”

Mr Redman said commercial trials in WA last year demonstrated successful cultivation and segregation of GM canola. “The 17 commercial growers of GM canola throughout the agricultural areas were impressed with the performance of the GM technology package when compared with other varieties of canola,” he said. More than 1,200 tonnes of GM canola were delivered to designated CBH Group receival sites during the trial. The report on the trials indicated there were 11 minor events and all were managed appropriately and segregation from paddock to port was achieved. Mr Redman said GM canola yields were comparable to non-GM varieties.

Growers reported the GM technology allowed efficient weed control and ease of management including the option to dry seed. “I do not expect GM canola to be suitable for all farming systems but it provides an additional tool for WA growers. Growers continue to have the choice of growing non-GM varieties,” the Minister said. “Western Australia is the major canola producing State in Australia and in 2008-09 we exported $535million worth of canola – most of it to our top five markets Netherlands, France, Pakistan, Japan and Belgium. “Access to modern technology is important for WA agriculture to help growers improve profitability and maintain international competitiveness.”

Major WA grain grower organisations support broader access to GM technology. GM canola varieties available in Australia have been deemed safe for human health and the environment by the Australian Gene Technology Regulator. A detailed report has been produced by the Department of Agriculture and Food on the 2009 GM canola trials and this would be made available to the public. The department would also provide information on growing and segregating GM and non-GM canola.

Access the report and more information on GM canola: http://www.agric.wa.gov.au/gmcrops Premier’s office – 9222 9475 Agriculture and Food Minister’s office – 9213 6700

SPECIAL ISSUE:
ISB News Report – January 2010

Biofortification of Plants through Genetic Engineering

The Accumulation of Novel Omega-3 Fatty Acids in Transgenic Plants

Johnathan Napier, Noemi Ruiz-Lopez, Tianbi Li, Richard Haslam, Olga Sayanova
One promising area of research pertains to the production of omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, the so called fish oils, in transgenic plants. The goal is not the direct replication of the fatty acid profile found in marine microbes or fish, but rather the nutritional enhancement of vegetable oils by the inclusion of specific marine fatty acids not normally synthesized by higher plants. In such a scenario, the dietary intake of these healthy fats would be achieved by consumption of omega-3 LC-PUFA-enhanced vegetable oils, without a need for increased consumption of fish or supplements.

Biofortification of Vitamin B6 in Seeds
Hao Chen, Liming Xiong
Animals need a continuous supply of vitamin B6 in their daily diet. Since plants are the major source of vitamin B6 for animals either directly or indirectly, it is of great interest to increase vitamin B6 levels in plants for improved nutrition value. By overexpressing PDX genes specifically in seeds using a seed-specific promoter, we increased the total vitamin B6 level three times over that of wild type. Our results indicate that the seed is a suitable target organ for engineering high levels of bio-available vitamin B6.

Iron Biofortification Of Rice By Targeted Genetic Engineering
Christof Sautter and Wilhelm Gruissem
Rice plants have been developed that contain six times more iron in polished rice kernels. To accomplish this, two plant genes were transferred into an existing rice variety. In the future, high-iron rice could help to reduce iron deficiency in human nutrition, especially in developing countries in Africa and Asia. Moreover, engineered plants will be useful to study the regulation of iron homeostasis in planta.

Feeding Future Populations With Nutritionally Complete Crops
Sonia Gomez-Galera, Shaista Naqvi, Gemma Farre , Georgina Sanahuja, Chao Bai, Teresa Capell, Changfu Zhu, and Paul Christou
Micronutrient deficiency diseases are rife in the developing world, causing millions of needless deaths and adding to miserable socio-economic conditions. Many strategies have been proposed to address nutrient deficiencies, including supplement distribution, fortification programs, and attempts to make crops more inherently nutritious. A relatively new approach is to create novel crop varieties that are more nutritious. The key is to take the part of the plant that is eaten and modify it to increase its ability to store minerals and capacity to synthesize vitamins.

ISB News Report
Published by Information Systems for Biotechnology, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA

Can GM Crops Feed The World?

The World Health Organization currently cites hunger as the gravest single threat to global public health. Without new technology and innovative farming methods, production will fail to keep up with an ever-increasing world population. Genetically modified (GM) crops hold out the possibility of much greater agricultural productivity in the developing world, with strains that are drought resistant and less environmentally degrading. Sir John Templeton was keenly interested in genetics precisely for its potential to provide such large-scale, transformative breakthroughs. He understood that major advances in genetics might serve to empower individuals and even to provide paths out of poverty.

By asking "Can GM Crops Feed the World?" the Foundation hopes to generate interest in a range of possible lines of inquiry. These include research on the environmental, economic, and social effects of GM crops; on financing mechanisms needed to give small-scale farmers access to GM crops; on the capacity of GM crops to spark wealth creation in the developing world; and on public apprehensions and misinformation about the use of GM crops and how these might be overcome.

The Foundation is still refining this Funding Priority for launch later this year. By June 1, we expect to post several Big Questions for applicants to consider as they prepare to submit Online Funding Inquiries starting on August 1.

News Releases
Monsanto Announces Record 11 Project Advancements in Annual Research and Development Pipeline Update

ST. LOUIS, Jan. 6, 2010 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/

— This year’s annual research and development (R&D) pipeline update marks many firsts for Monsanto Company (NYSE: MON). Among the record 11 project advancements are the first biotechnology product with a direct consumer dietary benefit and two of the largest commercial product launches in the company’s history…

…Monsanto’s SDA omega-3 soybeans also advanced to Phase 4. SDA omega-3 soybeans offer a sustainable, land-based source of SDA that readily converts to the heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acid found in fish oil. Last year, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a Generally Recognized As Safe notice affirming that the SDA omega-3 soybean oil could be used in a variety of foods. Food companies can now formulate and test the oil from SDA omega-3 soybeans in food products for future launch. Clinical studies have shown that consumption of SDA omega-3 soybean oil significantly raises blood levels of the heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acid EPA, also found in fish and fish oils.

See earlier post Omega 3 enhanced soybeans with SDA

David Spiegelhalter‘s Personal Home Page. 

Professor Spiegelhalter is Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk, University of Cambridge

 

Understanding Uncertainty and Risk

I work with a small team, all part time, comprising Arciris Garay-Arevalo (administration and research), Hauke Riesch (social scientist), Mike Pearson and Ian Short (web and animation), and Owen Smith (web). Our work focuses on the appropriate use of quantitative methods in dealing with risk and uncertainty in the lives of individuals and society. Our work falls into the broad category of ‘public understanding of science’, while our work with schools can be considered as ‘maths outreach’. However we try to take a view of the subject that extends beyond the application of probability and statistics, acknowledging that there are deeper uncertainties that cannot be easily put into a formal framework, and that social and psychological issues necessarily play a vital role. (more at link).

 

This leads to the following useful link:

Welcome to Understanding Uncertainty
Posted November 29th, 2007
Welcome to the site that tries to make sense of chance, risk, luck, uncertainty and probability. Mathematics won’t tell us what to do, but we think that understanding the numbers can help us deal with our own uncertainty and allow us to look critically at stories in the media.

David Spiegelhalter’s Personal Home Page

January 2010

The organic movement should overcome its hostility to genetically modified crops and embrace the contribution that they can make to sustainable farming, one of the world’s leading agricultural scientists has told The Times.

Although organic farmers are among the most implacable opponents of genetic engineering, it should be accepted as legitimate, according to Gordon Conway, Professor of International Development at Imperial College London and a former government adviser.

In an interview with The Times, he said that the ban on organic farmers using GM crops was based on an excessively rigid rejection of synthetic approaches to farming and a misconception that natural ways were safer and more environment- friendly than man-made ones….continued at link

Organic farmers must embrace GM crops if we are to feed the world, says scientist – Times Online

UT Arlington genome biologist reports on surprising evolutionary discovery
News Release — 6 January 2010

A recent study on the 8 percent of human DNA that is derived from viruses may show a cause of cell mutation and psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and mood disorders, according to an article by The University of Texas at Arlington biology professor Cédric Feschotte published in the Jan. 7, 2010, issue of Nature magazine.

The study — led by Professor Keizo Tomonaga at Osaka University in Japan — revealed that the genomes of humans and other mammals contain DNA derived from the insertion of bornaviruses, RNA viruses whose replication takes place in the nucleus of cells. It was the first to show sequences derived from a virus other than retroviruses. Researchers have known since 2001 that 8 percent of human genetic material is derived from retroviruses.

UTA News Center

Hybrid: The History and Science of Plant Breeding

by Noel Kingsbury
Copyright © 2009 The University of Chicago Press
Published by The University of Chicago Press

Disheartened by the shrink-wrapped, Styrofoam-packed state of contemporary supermarket fruits and vegetables, many shoppers hark back to a more innocent time, to visions of succulent red tomatoes plucked straight from the vine, gleaming orange carrots pulled from loamy brown soil, swirling heads of green lettuce basking in the sun.
With Hybrid, Noel Kingsbury reveals that even those imaginary perfect foods are themselves far from anything that could properly be called natural; rather, they represent the end of a millennia-long history of selective breeding and hybridization. Starting his story at the birth of agriculture, Kingsbury traces the history of human attempts to make plants more reliable, productive, and nutritious—a story that owes as much to accident and error as to innovation and experiment. Drawing on historical and scientific accounts, as well as a rich trove of anecdotes, Kingsbury shows how scientists, amateur breeders, and countless anonymous farmers and gardeners slowly caused the evolutionary pressures of nature to be supplanted by those of human needs—and thus led us from sparse wild grasses to succulent corn cobs, and from mealy, white wild carrots to the juicy vegetables we enjoy today. At the same time, Kingsbury reminds us that contemporary controversies over the Green Revolution and genetically modified crops are not new; plant breeding has always had a political dimension.
A powerful reminder of the complicated and ever-evolving relationship between humans and the natural world, Hybrid will give readers a thoughtful new perspective on—and a renewed appreciation of—the cereal crops, vegetables, fruits, and flowers that are central to our way of life.

Noel Kingsbury is internationally known as a writer on gardening, both private and public – and has carved out a particular reputation for his promotion of an approach to planting design which is based on ecological science. At both home (in Britain) and in North America his magazine articles and books have done much to help shift garden fashion away from conventional notions of formality and ‘tidiness’ towards a more naturalistic aesthetic and sustainable management.  Recent completion of a research doctorate at the University of Sheffield with one of the world’s foremost department of landscape, indicates his belief that practice must be supported by research and evidence.

Hybrid: The History and Science of Plant Breeding is copyright © 2009 The University of Chicago Press
Published by The University of Chicago Press
All rights reserved

SeedQuest Forum

Should Novel Organisms Developed Using Oligonucleotide-mediated Mutagenesis Be Excluded from the EU Regulation?
Didier Breyer, Philippe Herman, Annick Brandenburger, Godelieve Gheysen, Erik Remaut, Patrice Soumillion, Jan Van
Doorsselaere, René Custers, Katia Pauwels, Myriam Sneyers and Dirk Reheul

INFORMATION SYSTEMS FOR BIOTECHNOLOGY
ISB News Report pp. 9-12 (Nov. 2009) at http://www.isb.vt.edu/news/2009/Nov09.pdf
(Thanks to Drew Kershen. )

In the European Union, genetically modified organisms (GMO) and genetically modified microorganisms (GMM) are defined respectively according to Directives 2001/18/EC1 on deliberate release of GMO and 2009/41/EC2 on the contained use of GMM. The definition of a GMO is both technology and process-oriented. A novel organism will fall under the scope of the GMO Regulation only if it has been developed with the use of certain techniques. The EU Directives therefore include annexes that give additional information regarding the techniques that result in genetic modification, that are not considered to result in genetic modification, or that result in genetic modification but yield organisms that are excluded from the scope of the Directives.
The underlying idea is that some processes of genetic modification are potentially associated with risks. This approach is now challenged with the emergence of new techniques for which it is not always clear whether the resulting organisms shall be subject to the prevailing European GMO legislation or not. In a recent paper published in Environmental Biosafety Research 3, we discussed in detail regulatory and safety issues associated with the use of Oligonucleotide mediated mutagenesis and provided scientific arguments for not having organisms developed through this technique fall within the scope of the EU regulation of GMOs.

Oligonucleotide-mediated Mutagenesis

Oligonucleotide-mediated mutagenesis (OMM) is a technique used to correct or to introduce specific mutations at defined sites of an episomal or chromosomal target gene. OMM is also referenced in the literature under other names, e.g., targeted nucleotide exchange, chimeraplasty, Oligonucleotide mediated gene repair, or targeted gene repair. OMM is mediated through the introduction of a chemically synthesized oligonucleotide (single-stranded DNA oligonucleotide, chimeric RNA/DNA or DNA/DNA, RNA oligonucleotide) with homology to the target gene, except for the nucleotide(s) to be changed. The mechanisms of action at the molecular level are poorly understood, but DNA repair enzymes are involved, and the process involves primarily the activation of the mismatch repair and/or nucleotide excision repair…..continued at link

References
EC (2001) Directive 2001/18/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 March 2001 on the deliberate release into the environment of genetically modified organisms and repealing Council Directive 90/220/EEC. Off. J. Eur. Union L 106: 1-38
EC (2009) Directive 2009/41/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 May 2009 on the contained use of genetically modified micro-organisms. Off. J. Eur. Union L 125, 75-97
Breyer D, Herman P, Brandenburger A, Gheysen G, Remaut E, Soumillion P, Van Doorsselaere J, Custers R, Pauwels K, Sneyers M & Reheul D (2009) Genetic modification through oligonucleotide-mediated mutagenesis. A GMO regulatory challenge? Environ Biosafety Res. DOI: 10.1051/ebr/2009007
BASF (2009) BASF and Cibus achieve development milestone in CLEARFIELD® Production System. http://www.basf.com/group/
pressrelease/P-09-119 (accessed August 25th 2009)
Nielsen KM (2003) Transgenic organisms – time for conceptual diversification? Nature Biotechnology 21, 227-228
COGEM (2006) New techniques in plant biotechnology (COGEM Report CGM/061024-02). Commissie Genetische Modificatie, The Netherlands. http://www.cogem.net/ (accessed August 25th 2009)
Jacobsen E, Schouten HJ (2008) Cisgenesis, a new tool for traditional plant breeding, should be exempted from the regulation on genetically modified organisms in a step by step approach. Potato Research 51, 75-88