The discovery of another unapproved variety of GM wheat in Montana this summer has increased pressure on the government to change the way it regulates the technology

EXCERPT: Freese, whose organization is calling for a moratorium on all biotech trials “until the USDA can get its act together”, said it is not clear that contamination can be prevented. He said the department should at least impose much stricter regulation, such as larger buffer zones between the test crop and non-GMO varieties, more field trial inspections, and increased fines to penalize companies that violate a testing protocol or fail to do an adequate job cleaning up after conducting a field trial.

“The contamination episodes show how weak and full of holes the regulatory system is and, frankly, farmers deserve much better from USDA,” he said.

GMO wheat issue intensifies

Christopher Doering
Great Falls Tribune, 26 Oct 2014
http://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/local/2014/10/27/gmo-wheat-issue-intensifies/17985699/

The discovery of another unapproved variety of genetically modified wheat in Montana this summer has increased pressure on the government agency in charge of overseeing biotech crops to change the way it regulates a technology used on millions of acres across the United States.

In September, the Agriculture Department’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service said it found the Monsanto wheat two months earlier on a research field at Montana State University, more than a decade after the crop was legally tested there between 2000 and 2003. The finding came as the USDA concluded a nearly yearlong probe into a similar wheat discovery in Oregon found in May 2013. In that case, the government was unable to determine how the modified seeds developed by Monsanto appeared eight years after testing ended for the biotech variety. Neither wheat strain has been approved for sale or consumption.

The popular crops are staunchly defended by farmers who depend on genetically altered seeds to provide them with higher yields, better quality products and lower consumption of chemical sprays to rebuff attacks from weeds or insects; the result is a boon to their bottom line. The United States is by far the world’s largest grower of biotech crops, planting 173 million acres in 2013 — almost 40 percent of all biotech acreage globally.

But food and environmental groups are skeptical about the safety of these crops in everyday foods and the environment in which they grow. The discovery of unapproved wheat has renewed calls for APHIS to adapt a slower, more stringent approval process — a change that could cause havoc for agricultural producers eager to get their hands on the newest varieties.

“I’d like to say it was surprising that these events happened, but it’s not really. It’s become the norm, rather than the exception,” said Bill Freese, a frequent critic of biotech crops who is a science policy analyst at the Center for Food Safety. “They’re not able to prevent contamination from these experimental (genetically engineered) crops to commercial crops, and that’s just caused headaches, huge headaches, very serious financial losses for American agriculture. What’s it going to take to have proper oversight?”

Each year, hundreds of tests are conducted around the United States, mostly on corn, soybeans and alfalfa by seed giants including Monsanto, Syngenta and DuPont Pioneer. In the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, APHIS authorized planting of more than 500 crops that could be tested on as many as 11,300 sites across the nation.

APHIS said of the 500 crops, there were 11 incidents of noncompliance with field test regulations reported, with five of those being minor violations, largely tied to incorrectly filled-out paperwork. None were considered major incidents such as unauthorized plantings without a permit. APHIS would not publicly disclose the location of the violations.

Genetically modified seeds were first introduced commercially in the United States in 1996 with the launch of Monsanto’s Roundup Ready soybeans — a plant that tolerates the company’s Roundup herbicide while nearby weeds are killed. Since then, biotech has blossomed into a major force in agriculture to include corn, papaya, sugar beets, cotton, and squash.

Freese, whose organization is calling for a moratorium on all biotech trials “until the USDA can get its act together”, said it is not clear that contamination can be prevented. He said the department should at least impose much stricter regulation, such as larger buffer zones between the test crop and non-GMO varieties, more field trial inspections, and increased fines to penalize companies that violate a testing protocol or fail to do an adequate job cleaning up after conducting a field trial.

“The contamination episodes show how weak and full of holes the regulatory system is and, frankly, farmers deserve much better from USDA,” he said.

John Youngberg, executive vice president with the Montana Farm Bureau, said discoveries such as the recent wheat varieties can provide fodder for critics and make it more difficult for farmers and biotech crop supporters.

“We’re watching this sort of thing,” Youngberg said. “It’s easy to say it’s bad for you. It always casts a cloud over” the benefits of the technology.

Youngberg said biotech proponents initially spent too much time touting the benefits of the crops for farmers, rather than sharing with consumers how they benefit from the seeds through cheaper foods and a more robust supply.

“We need to try to do a better job of getting that message out,” he said.

Michael Firko, deputy administrator of APHIS’ Biotechnology Regulatory Services, said the agency believes the current process used to regulate field trials “is more than sufficient” and improvements have made a moratorium unnecessary.

Here’s how the trial process works: Almost three-quarters of trials are approved by APHIS under an expedited system covering plants deemed to be low risk and where the agency has prior knowledge; the rest are covered as part of a permit process for unfamiliar or novel genes that need to be more closely regulated.

APHIS inspects all trials being conducted under the permit process at least once a year, and as many as seven times for plants designed to produce a pharmaceutical drug or an industrial protein. The trials approved under the expedited system are randomly selected by a computer to be reviewed, meaning about 16 percent to 17 percent of them are inspected annually.

In recent years, APHIS cited several steps it has taken to tighten its oversight of field trials, including streamlining compliance and enforcement, improving the process it uses to determine which field trials to inspect, increasing the number of inspections conducted annually and educating those conducting the trials about how to comply with the regulations.

“We have in place science-based requirements for field trials that ensure there is not an introduction of these crops while they are being field-tested,” Firko said. When asked if the recent wheat discoveries could slow the growth of genetically modified crops, Firko said APHIS will continue to regulate “and give rigorous review” to new biotech varieties the agency is asked to review for approval.

Greg Jaffe, director of the Project on Biotechnology for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, said the USDA needs to be more transparent about how many inspections it conducts, how they target those inspections and what they find. He also said that while the department sets buffer zones to be put in place between biotech field trials and traditional varieties, it fails to do enough testing to make sure the boundaries are large enough to be successful.

“I would hope that USDA would use this as an opportunity to do some research about the efficacy of their field trail conditions that they put in place,” he said.

Still, Jaffe said, because neither of the wheat findings had an impact on the environment or food safety, there is little impetus for the government to move expeditiously to make changes to its oversight. “Overall, there are hundreds and hundreds of field trials done every year, and we’re talking about some fairly isolated incidences that luckily did not have any trade, food safety, or environmental impacts,” he said. “These incidences, while troubling, don’t really have any impact so USDA will move much more meticulously.”

The Center for Food Safety and other groups that have renewed calls for tougher government oversight following the rouge wheat discoveries point to a series of other high-profile contamination cases the past 15 years as evidence of both the inability of the government to regulate agricultural biotechnology and the hit to the pocketbook these findings can have on Corn Belt farmers who depend on the popular crops for income.

After the discovery of Oregon wheat, Japan, South Korea and other countries temporarily stopped buying U.S. wheat. And China, a major buyer of U.S. corn, has rejected imports since November after it said officials found evidence of a genetically modified corn seed developed by Syngenta that the nation has not approved. Trade groups estimate the rejected shipments have cost U.S. farmers more than $1 billion through lower corn prices, leading producers in nearly a dozen states and agribusiness companies such as Cargill to sue Syngenta.

In 2000, the U.S. corn market was battered after a variety of biotech corn known as Starlink, approved for animal feed but not human consumption, turned up in some grocery store products. Among the most publicized was Kraft Foods, which announced a nationwide recall of taco shells, the first of a food made from genetically modified ingredients.

Lola Raska, executive vice president of the Montana Grain Growers Association, said the recent wheat finding has not damaged trade relations and farmers are optimistic that biotech wheat will one day be approved to help them remain competitive.

“Our growers know they need access to the most advanced technology available, including biotech seed varieties, in order to continue producing the high quality wheat Montana is known for worldwide,” Raska said. “Crops that already use biotechnology, like corn and soybeans, are becoming more adaptable and more profitable to grow in areas that have traditionally grown crops like wheat and barley.”

Contact Christopher Doering at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Twitter: @cdoering