Here we go again...

EXCERPT: A bio-engineering scientist in Turkey with five years of experience in DNA testing of transgenic crops said that she came to the subject with an open mind, "neither for nor against, but now the risk side seems to outweigh the benefits for me."

She declined to reveal her name while pursuing a court case against her university for this month reassigning her to another department and taking her lab away...

She was days away from final stage testing on seed samples gathered around Turkey when the news came from her rector.

... she believes "GM [contaminated] corn and soy to be growing [in Turkey], Turkey's two largest crops, and of course we already found [GM] tomatoes."
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Turkey working to form policy on genetically modified organisms
Risk to biological (and career) diversity
MICHAEL KUSER
Turkish Daily News (ISTANBUL)
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=14143

The introduction of transgenic crops is especially sensitive in Turkey, which boasts a rich biological stock with over 12,000 species of flora and fauna. This compares to 13,000 in all of Europe.

Archeologists have found the earliest strains of domesticated wheat in the fertile crescent of ancient Mesopotamia, specifically at a site in present day Turkey near the Syrian border.

A bio-engineering scientist in Turkey with five years of experience in DNA testing of transgenic crops said that she came to the subject with an open mind, "neither for nor against, but now the risk side seems to outweigh the benefits for me."

She declined to reveal her name while pursuing a court case against her university for this month reassigning her to another department and taking her lab away. The researcher had raised funds from government and industry (80,000 euros from the State Planning Organization and 175,000 euros from Turkish food conglomerate Ülker) to set up an independent laboratory.

She was days away from final stage testing on seed samples gathered around Turkey when the news came from her rector.

The chairman of the Agricultural Engineers Association, Gökhan Günaydýn, said they were aware of the woman's situation and were writing a formal letter of support.

"Where the pressure comes from is not clear, except that the same pressure is coming to our association," he said. "They blame us as anti-GMO activists, but I stood up in Parliament last month and said that we have no financial ties to any of these companies, unlike certain academicians who have a salary from their university and at the same time, take money as consultants to industry."

Researchers in the UK conducted tests on the effects on bio-diversity of GM oil seed rape and corn, studying the amount of weed seeds and biomass left after harvest.

Overall results showed a detrimental effect on wild plants and animals, though initial lower rates of herbicide application with the corn crop benefited insects and birds.

The trouble in Turkey is that the government is trying to please all sides -- the public, the EU and the United States.

"The ministry (agriculture) has changed its tune every time, from no GM seeds at all, to only some, to no GM grain imports, to only those for animal feed," said the university researcher.

For example, Günaydýn cited a study at Middle Eastern Technical University (METU) that found GM tomato seeds in Turkey.

"The minister of agriculture said it was not true, that testing was complicated and that the school must have made a mistake, but METU researcher Candan Gurakan came back and asserted that foreign labs had confirmed the findings," he said.

Everyone interviewed agreed that Turkish customs does nothing to control the importation of GMO seeds. "Customs does absolutely no testing, only accepting the importer's declaration," said Günaydýn.

The temporarily anonymous university researcher said she believes "GM corn and soy to be growing, Turkey's two largest crops, and of course we already found tomatoes."

Testing is difficult if you don't know what you're looking for, such as is required with protein-specific field tests.

Researchers worry about the risk to biodiversity because the newly introduced traits come from dominant genes, which mean they may be very difficult, if not impossible, to breed out. The woman mentioned American approval of patented crops in Iraq as a real danger to Turkey's huge GAP irrigation project in the Southeast. The risk from cross-pollination is very real to one of the country's most important agricultural production areas.

"I hear they are passing out free samples of the seed in Manisa and Adipazari, corn seed," said the besieged researcher. "The ministry just doesn't want to be the one to say GMOs already exist in Turkey."

BOX
Genetic modification for agricultural purposes aims at either making a plant poisonous to insects or tolerant to various herbicides.

The most famous herbicide-related treatment prepares a plant to tolerate glyophosphate, a weed-killer patented by Monsanto and marketed under the trade name Roundup.

Crop seed bio-engineered to tolerate the herbicide is marketed as Roundup Ready.

Chemical companies involved in the business of
developing biotechnology for agricultural applications aim to "stack" the genetic traits, so that a corn resistant to certain herbicides may also contain a protein toxic to insects.

The most common form of built-in pesticide comes from transferring a gene from a common soil bacterium, Bacillus thuringiensis, into a plant, say corn, which then renders the corn's leaf tissue toxic to caterpillars, which feed on that crop. Corn engineered in this way is known as Bt corn.