No appetite for altered crops
July 13, 1999
BY JIM RITTER SCIENCE REPORTER
Any American food company that hopes to do business in Europe better make
sure its food genes are politically correct.
Terra Prima, the maker of Apache organic tortilla chips, learned that lesson the
hard way.
Terra Prima bought corn from a farmer who guaranteed his crop had not been
genetically engineered. His organic corn contained no foreign genes. However,
neighboring farms did grow "GE" corn, and a few pollen grains apparently blew
in and pollinated the organic corn.
A German magazine, which had hired a laboratory to examine American food
imports, discovered the contamination. Apache corn chips, the lab reported,
contained 0.1 percent of GE corn.
It might well have been plutonium. Knowing no one would buy the corn chips,
even though they were safe to eat, Terra Prima recalled 87,000 bags.
On the issue of GE foods, the cultural divide between the United States and
Europe is as wide as the Atlantic, and American exporters are suffering the
consequences.
The United States once exported 2.7 million tons of corn to Europe, about 5
percent of the export market. But the United States is expected to export almost
no corn to Europe after the 1999 harvest.
"It's a key market for us, and any time we lose a market, it is significant," said
Susan Keith of the National Corn Growers Association.
Genetic engineers splice genes from foreign organisms into crops to give the
crops desired traits. For example, genetically engineered corn contains a gene
from a soil microbe that makes the corn poisonous to insect pests.
The United States produces three-fourths of the world's GE crops, and
American supermarket shelves are lined with hundreds of foods containing
genetically engineered ingredients. But many Europeans recoil from what
opponents call "Frankenstein foods."
European protesters have destroyed dozens of experimental plots of GE crops.
Opponents in England conducted sit-ins and "decontaminations" of GE test fields.
In France, farmers broke into a warehouse and urinated on GE corn.
The world's two largest food companies, Nestle and Unilever, have announced
they no longer will make foods containing GE ingredients. Nestle is based in
Switzerland and Unilever in the Netherlands and Britain.
The opposition to GE foods is perhaps strongest in Britain, where a recent poll
found only 1 percent of respondents believe GE foods are good for society.
Prince Charles doesn't allow his tenant farmers to grow GE foods, and he won't
serve GE foods to guests. In an article in the Daily Telegraph, the prince wrote
that genetic engineering "takes mankind into realms that belong to God and to
God alone."
While the American Medical Association says the health and economic benefits
of GE food greatly exceed any risk posed to society, the British Medical
Association has called for a moratorium on the commercial planting of GE crops.
Observers give several explanations for why the United States and Britain, both
technologically advanced countries, differ so much on GE foods:
"Mad cow" backlash. The British government lost credibility over its handling
of "mad cow" disease, which can spread to humans through contaminated food.
The disease killed 39 people in Britain, and now many Britons don't trust
government assurances that GE food is safe.
Media. British tabloids have fanned fears with such headlines as "Mutant Crops
Could Kill You" and "This Terrifying Tampering." The U.S. media have given
scant coverage to GE foods. However, coverage has picked up here since
researchers reported in May that GE corn pollen can kill monarch butterflies in
the lab.
Politics. Biotechnology is a hot political issue in Britain. Conservatives have
attacked Prime Minister Tony Blair for his defense of GE foods. But
biotechnology has not become politicized in the United States.
"We're almost like a one-party system on this," said Andrew Kimbrell of the
International Center for Technology Assessment. "We don't have any political
leaders that have the courage to buck biotechnology companies and represent
consumer interests."
Trade barriers. Europe's resistance to GE food might in part be an effort to
protect its farmers from U.S. food imports. "Countries are creating artificial
trade barriers with baseless arguments that hurt American farmers," said Sen.
Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).
In the United States, genetically engineered corn typically is mixed with regular
corn during harvest and transport to grain elevators. Thus, any shipment of corn
is bound to include varieties of GE corn that have not been approved by the
European Union. So importers are refusing to take shipments from America.
Major grain companies, including Cargill and ConAgra, are trying to make
American corn acceptable to Europe by separating out unapproved varieties.
But as the tortilla chip case illustrates, it might prove impossible to ensure that
exports are 100 percent pure, Keith said.
Unlike corn, all varieties of GE soybeans grown in the United States have been
approved by the European Union. And the American Soybean Association
wants to keep it that way.
Last spring, AgrEvo USA was ready to introduce a new GE soybean,
LibertyLink, in the United States. The U.S. government has approved
LibertyLink, but the European Union has not. Under pressure from the soybean
association, AgrEvo has delayed introduction of LibertyLink in the United States
until it's approved for overseas markets.
The soybean association fears LibertyLink soybeans could cause rejection of the
entire U.S. soybean crop, just as unapproved GE corn varieties have for the
U.S. corn crop.
The soybean association, U.S. Agriculture Department and U.S. trade officials
are urging the European Union to speed up its approval of new GE varieties. But
given Europe's wariness of biotechnology, that doesn't appear likely any time
soon.
suntimes.com |
