1. Wheat breeder avoids the GMO path
2. GM anticancer brooccoli hype - again
3. Terminator hype?
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1. Wheat breeder avoids the GMO path
Robert Shubert
Crop Choice News July 30, 2001
(July 30, 2001 CropChoice news) Stephen Jones said "no" to developing transgenic wheat for the biotechnology industry. "I view my job of public breeder as being public," says the Washington State University wheat breeder. "Therefore, I am opposed to the commercialization of anything a public breeder creates."
Several life science company representatives have asked Jones, a geneticist, to contract with them to engineer herbicide resistance into the varieties of winter wheat with which he works. Monsanto intends to commercialize its transgenic wheat that resists the herbicide Roundup (glyphosate), sometime between 2003 and 2005. BASF markets a mutagenically derived herbicide resistant wheat called Clearfield®.
Jones has declined for two reasons. One, he says that growers have already paid for research into wheat through their checkoff money (and taxes). Two, Jones thinks that the direction of research is following a business model rather than a scientific course. The patenting of plants, to which he is opposed, is one of the results.
"The exchange of ideas and material between public researchers and research institutions has declined," he says. "Everyone is trying to make a profit from this." A better course of action would be to direct research toward what society wants. And it appears that it does not want biotech food.
"I’m not necessarily against the science used to create GMO's (genetically modified organisms)," he says "but there is potential for trainwrecks. What concern me more are the practitioners, not the practice. We shouldn’ t do this just because we can."
In relation to the ad campaigns of life science companies that tout a "save the world" theme, Jones has a burning question to ask: "What if curing starvation isn’t profitable? It certainly is not today. Thirty-five thousand people starve each day on the planet mostly because of poverty and politics. Why aren’t they fixing this today? Why wait for a sexy untested privately owned technology? I think it’s ruthless to promote this with claims that they are going to decrease human misery. Their track record so far has been less than inspiring."
Rather than continuing to focus on single-gene solutions to insects and weeds, which don’t work because they’ll adapt, Jones favors placing more emphasis on sustainable agriculture; his traditional wheat breeding program also runs an organic and perennial wheat project. (Check out the Land Institute website a http://www.landinstitute.org and others for more general information).
"The answer isn’t a bigger, stronger tool necessarily," he says. "It’s to use fewer chemicals." And to those who, after reading that last quote, would tout the biotechnology industry line that transgenic crops are reducing pesticide application, studies and grower testimonials show that pesticide usage has not declined. For more information about this, see the following:
-- Report points out problems with Roundup Ready soybeans http://www.cropchoice.com/leadstry.asp?recid=312
-- Study finds that benefits of Bt corn may not outweigh potential risks
http://www.cropchoice.com/leadstry.asp?recid=366
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"We have come a long way, but we can go much further with conventional breeding to obtain higher yields and better disease resistance and grain quality." - Professor John Snape of the John Innes Centre (Farmers Weekly, 10 March 2000)
"Genetic transformation is just one particular wrench in the biotechnology tool box. We have lots of other tools to accelerate the development of new wheat varieties.... It's a numbers game and ultimately non-transformation [ie non-GM] biotech offers the greatest potential." - Tom Crosbie, Monsanto's global head of plant breeding
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2. "GM anticancer brooccoli" keeps doing the rounds - John Innes Centre schools' project/Foresight project/ now a BBSRC internet questionnaire (see below) - all regardless of the fact that just such a broccoli has already been successfully bred through classical breeding! http://members.tripod.com/~ngin/broccoli.htm
Bio-htpe clearly contains slow-release ingredients that resist digestion!
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WHAT ABOUT A SMART BANANA?
August 10, 2001
Science Volume 293, Number 5532
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol293/issue5532/r-samples.shtml
How do Brits like the idea of being able to eat tropical fruits grown locally? That's one thing the U.K. government is trying to find out with a new Internet questionnaire that. According to this story, aims to survey what the average man on the Web thinks of future foods, including genetically modified (GM) products.
The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council is asking participants about five potential new products: Scotland-grown bananas; no-calorie cake; anticancer broccoli; lasagna that keeps for months at room temperature; and "smart" labels that could detect when something's gone bad.
A council spokesperson says that so far, people have been quite keen for the zero-calorie cake, which is described as having "intelligent" slow- release ingredients that resist digestion, although one thoughtful respondent asked: "What about the faeces resulting from this product class?" Smart labels also drew positive reactions, even though these would require special scanners and appliances that could read the labels' cooking instructions. The long-lived lasagna, however, has met with some skepticism: "It's bad enough having frozen meals which only last a couple of months--god forbid we have things that last years!" wrote one consumer. As for anticancer broccoli, wrote another, "How many people actually LIKE broccoli?" AndScottish bananas are definitely not the wave of the future
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3. Terminator hype?
Subject: On Terminator Gene {from AgBioView]
From: Hartmut Meyer <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
>Re: USDA Says Yes To Terminator
>From: William Muir <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.> (posted to an Internet discussion group)
Dear William,
In your recent contribution in AgBioView on the Terminator technology you mentioned that "Terminator type technology is exactly what is needed to prevent such harm", which means "to ensure the gene cannot spread". I heard this biosafety argument in some discussions in Germany and asked the speakers to clarify the issue in more detail.
My point was: As far as I understood the technology, such plants are still able to produce pollen and to cross with sexually compatible plants. Parts of the following generation than will carry - according to the genetic rules - the Terminator genes and as a consequence produce infertile seeds. So Terminator technology will not stop cross pollination per se but the spread of (trans) genes in the following generations.
I asked following questions:
1) Is my above understanding correct?
If yes:
1) What will happen to those sexually compatible wild populations which year by year produce a certain amount of infertile individuals?
2) Will the population suffer from this cross pollination with Terminator genes?
3) What will happen to farmers who rely on own seed production and seed saving from their harvest, if their plants will be cross pollinated by neighbouring Terminator crops year by year?
Unluckily nobody could answer my questions, because those speakers developed their arguments and rationale of the lecture on the understanding that Terminator genes prevent transgene spreading as such.
Can you give answer my questions? Thanks a lot,
- Hartmut Meyer; German NGO Working Group on Biological Diversity