"Unprecedented, dangerous and irreversible experiment with our wild forests"
The Global Justice Ecology Project released the following statement regarding the announcement by the USDA of the decision to deregulate the genetically engineered (GE) Darling 54 American chestnut tree:
“Given the current trend toward the disregard of science and concern for the environment by US environmental agencies, the USDA decision to deregulate the GE American chestnut is not a surprise. But it is disappointing to those who care about forest health and the return of the wild American chestnut.
“This decision marks the beginning of an unprecedented, dangerous and irreversible experiment with our wild forests. Never before has a GE plant been released into the wild with the intent to contaminate its natural relatives with GE traits.
“This decision was made despite the fact that three years after the submission of the deregulation petition, the GE chestnut was revealed to be rife with problems including high rates of mortality and loss of blight resistance. It was subsequently discovered that researchers had been testing the wrong tree for seven years.
“These findings led the major partner in the research, the American Chestnut Foundation (TACF) to drop their support for the deregulation of the GE chestnut in late-2023. TACF details these problems on their website concluding:
”‘The disappointing performance of the D54 trees in the field and the observed lethal homozygosity [when an organism inherits two copies of a mutated, essential gene (a homozygous state) that results in death, often during embryonic development or early life], have led TACF to conclude that this product should not be distributed or propagated beyond permitted sites. TACF believes these genetic issues should not be proliferated into current or future restoration or commercial chestnut populations.’ (See full statement and photographs here.)
“The USDA decision to ignore these problems and concerns and allow the release of the D54 into the wild is both reckless and dangerous.
“The USDA is bending to the interests of companies like SilvaBio seeking to profit from the tragic loss of American chestnut trees, despite the fact that releasing these GE trees into our forests will directly threaten the ability of the wild American chestnut to return.
“Wild American chestnuts that survived the blight have disease resistance that they pass on to their offspring. In some regions, wild American chestnuts are already making a return. Yet SilvaBio is willing to risk the future of these wild trees for short-sighted profits from the mass-sale of their defective D54 chestnuts.
“Decades of work to bring back the wild American chestnut by organisations such as the American Chestnut Cooperators’ Foundation, renowned biologist Bernd Heinrich and many others is callously disregarded and irreparably damaged by this decision by the USDA that disregards real science surrounding the flaws of the OXO genetic insertion, human error, and abysmal field results of the tree.”
Source: Global Justice Ecology Project
More on the failure of the GMO chestnut
Watch the video documenting the return of thousands of wild American chestnuts: The Wild American Chestnut: A Giant Returns
Image: Blight on genetically engineered American chestnut sapling. Copyright: TACF
