Life after GE Nightmare

Dr. Mae-Wan Ho

Presented at ISP European Parliament Briefing, Keep Europe GM-Free!

Institute of Science in Society www.i-sis.org.uk and

Independent Science Panel www.indsp.org

Taking stock

In 2003, a total of 67.7mHa were planted with GM crops worldwide; USA is the biggest producer by far, accounting for 63.2% of the acreage, Argentina, a poor second, has 20.5%. Soya beans are planted on 61.2%, maize comes a distant second at 22.9% ahead of cotton and oilseed rape [1]. The vast majority � more than 73% - are herbicide tolerant, 18% are insect resistant and the rest have both traits (Tables 1 � 3).

That sounds impressive until you realise that the 67.7mHa planted with GM crops are a mere 1.3% of the 5019.6mHa agricultural land in the world [2], and they are overwhelmingly confined to just two countries. GM crops are minority commodities, far behind organic crops, for example; and they are showing all the signs of collapse.

The last biotech giant Syngenta departed UK in June 2004, following Monsanto, Dupont and Bayer Cropscience [3]. The health sector has not done any better, judging from

headlines in Wall Street Journal [4]: �Biotech's dismal bottom line: More than $40 billion in losses�; � Not only has the biotech industry yielded negative financial returns for decades, it generally digs its hole deeper every year.�

The mainstream press and biotech scientists blame �luddites and activists� for driving big business away. But the real reason for big business' demise is that they simply got their science wrong, as explained in my book, Living with the Fluid Genome [5].

The fluid genome

Genetic engineering began in the mid 1970s under the illusion that the genome � the totality of the genetic material that defines a species - is constant and static, and the characteristics of an organism hardwired in its genes. This was summed up in the �Central Dogma' of molecular biology put forward by Francis Crick.

But geneticists soon found to their surprise that the genome is dynamic and �fluid'; both the expression and structure of genes are constantly changing under the influence of the environment (see Fig. 1).

The processes responsible for the �fluid genome' are precisely orchestrated by the organism as a whole, in a highly coordinated �dance of life' that's necessary for survival. In contrast, genetic engineering in the laboratory is crude, imprecise and invasive. The rogue genes inserted into a genome to make a genetically modified (GM) plant or animal could land anywhere; typically in a rearranged or defective form, scrambling the host genome at the site of insertion, and have the tendency to move or rearrange further once inserted. Consequently, GM varieties are overwhelmingly unstable.

Regulators everywhere turned a blind eye to these inherent problems until the European Union passed a new deliberate release directive in 2001, which requires companies to submit data documenting the genetic stability of each GM variety.

Last year, French government scientists checked five GM varieties already commercialised, and found all the GM inserts had rearranged themselves. The results were presented at a conference with the title: �Characterisation of commercial GMO inserts: a source of useful material to study genome fluidity� [6]. It is indeed genome fluidity that makes genetic modification both futile and hazardous [5].

Belgian scientists confirmed those results, and found some GM varieties not only unstable but also non-uniform. The GM varieties should all be illegal under Europe's new directive

Genetic instability is a serious safety issue, as the GM varieties are now different from earlier generations that were assessed and licensed as safe for cropping or for food and feed. And indeed there are major concerns over safety of GM food and feed that have not been addressed.

Major uncertainties over the safety of the GM process

•  The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) gave Monsanto's GM maize Mon863, containing the biopesticide Cry3Bb1 a positive assessment, despite �very disturbing� results of feeding trials showing kidney malformations and increased white blood cells in male rats and high blood sugar and reduced immature red blood cells in female rats [7].

•  Last year, up to 100 villagers in the south of the Philippines living near GM maize plots became ill when the GM maize came into flower [8]. Terje Traavik of the Norwegian Institute of Gene Ecology in Tromsø found antibodies to Cry1Ab produced by the GM maize in the blood of 39 villagers [9]. The same illnesses recurred this year [10].

•  Between 2001 and 2002, twelve dairy cows died on a farm in Hesse, Germany, after eating Syngenta's Bt176 GM maize, and others in the herd had to be slaughtered on account of mysterious illnesses [11]. T he Spanish Food Safety Authority has withdrawn authorisation for Bt176 cultivation [12].

•  Arpad Pusztai and colleagues found that GM potatoes with snowdrop lectin adversely affected every organ system of young rats, and the stomach and small intestine lining grew up to twice the thickness of controls [13].

•  Scientists in Egypt found similar results in the gastrointestinal tract of mice fed GM potato with Bt toxin [14].

•  US Food and Drug Administration had data since the early 1990s showing that rats fed GM tomato es with antisense gene to delay ripening developed small holes in their stomach [13].

•  Aventis (now Bayer) found 100% increase in deaths of broiler chickens fed glufosinate-tolerant GM maize T25 compared to controls [15].

•  Numerous anecdotes from farmers and others indicate that livestock, wildlife and lab animals avoid GM feed, and fail to thrive or die when forced to eat it [15, 16].

Different species of GM food or feed with different GM genes have caused problems in many species of animals. You don't have to be a scientific genius to suspect that there is something wrong with the GM process itself or the GM insert common to them.

The GM industry was launched on a scientific myth. It is time to draw a curtain over it, for there's plenty of life after the genetic engineering nightmare.

How to live with the fluid genome

The fluid genome is telling us that we have been completely misguided in our health and environmental policies.

Genes, unlike diamonds are not forever. The responsiveness of genes and genomes to the environment makes clear that the only way to keep them constant and healthy is to have a balanced ecology. On the other hand, it is definitely futile to think that we can go on ruining our ecosystem and still keep healthy if we have �good' genes.

New evidence - featured in successive issues of our magazine Science in Society - shows that toxic agents in the environment can scramble genome sequences [17], and that those scrambled sequences may be linked to a range of chronic illnesses such Gulf War Syndrome, chronic fatigue syndrome, autoimmune diseases and leukaemia.

Recent research also reveals that the mother's diet can change the whole pattern of gene expression in her unborn child, affecting its long-term health prospects in susceptibility to chronic diseases much later on in life, diseases such as cancer, stroke, diabetes, schizophrenia, and manic depression [18]. Moreover, these effects can persist through successive generations.

On the other hand, appropriate dietary supplements are also able to reverse some of those damaging effects by changing the genes themselves. Female mice given dietary supplements before they became pregnant, turned a large proportion of the offspring, which would have been obese, into lean and healthy mice. More remarkably, rat mothers who cared well for their pups mark the pups' genes for life, reducing their response to stress [19].

All that is to say, given half the chance, the fluid genome can even mend itself, if we stop insulting it with bad air, bad water and bad food.

The organic revolution in science

The fluid genome is just one aspect of the organic revolution in western science that has been happening since the beginning of the last century, but which has been temporarily eclipsed by the mechanistic biology of the Central Dogma. The contrast is striking: the mechanical way is a linear chain of command and control, the organic way is intercommunication and participation at all levels.

As a special treat, I am offering you a new vision of the healthy organism engaged in its �dance of life'. Electric and electromagnetic energies enable the tissues and cells and all the molecules in the body to intercommunicate and coordinate their activities through a liquid crystalline continuum. When intercommunication and coordination are perfect, we get to a state of coherence or wholeness. The living organism is so coherent that all its molecules are dancing coherently together to produce the full colours of the rainbow, hence the title of my book on the subject [20].

This is not just a pretty image. It tells us that the organism captures and stores a lot of coherent energy over a range of activities from the ultrafast to the extremely slow, from the very local to the global, and it mobilises that energy most rapidly and efficiently with minimum loss or dissipation.

In the same way, sustainable ecosystems [21, 22] depend on diverse species to capture and store as much living energy as possible, ranging over all space and time scales, from bacteria to whales and redwood giants [23].

The model of agriculture promoted by western science for half a century is the high-yielding monoculture of the green revolution, depending on high inputs: fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, not to mention water from huge irrigation projects, all of which have done untold damages to the environment, driven small farmers off the land and into poverty and suicide.

The loss of biodiversity from the monocultures of the green revolution is tremendous. Of 7 000 species consumed by people, 103 species comprise 90% of the world's food crops, and only three, rice, wheat and maize, provide 50% of the calories and 56% of the protein [24].

This is what it used to be like, now preserved in the Gunung Haliman National Park, in West Java, Indonesia, a wonderful mix of rice terraces with forest gardens teaming with life and biodiversity. Biodiversity and productivity go together, as real farmers everywhere on earth have always known.

Academic ecologists are just now rediscovering the same. In a long-term experiment started in 1994 in the University of Minnesota St. Paul, David Tilman and colleagues [25] showed that fields became increasingly productive as more and more species are planted together in the field, and they get better year after year. Biodiverse fields were two to three times more productive. Biomass increased not just above ground but below ground as well, which is good news for sequestering carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to ameliorate climate change. David Tilman also told me that the biodiverse fields were organically maintained in later years as they became fairly immune to weeds [26].

There has been a lot of innovation in traditional ecological farming all over the world since the 1980s, which is accompanied by the recovery of indigenous biodiversity.

Here's Takao Furano, whom I visited in 1999 [27], holding a bottle of organic sake brewed from his own rice. The label says, �one bird ten thousand treasures�. The bird is the duckling he introduces into the paddy fields with the rice seedlings, which feeds on the insect pests, weeds seed and the golden snail (thus turning pests into resources), aerate the water, provide mechanical stimulation for the rice plants to grow thick and strong and yield more, make droppings to feed the daphnia and other small organisms in the water that feed on the plankton, and provide food for the roach. The duckweed floating on the surface of the water is very efficient in fixing nitrogen, attracts insects, and is also food for the ducklings. Duckweed provides hiding places for the fish. It is very prolific; doubling every three days, so it can be harvested for cattle-feed.

At the end of the year, Furano gets a bumper harvest of 7 tonnes of rice, 300 ducks, 4000 ducklings and countless fish from 1.4ha of paddy fields. Another 0.6ha goes to produce organic vegetables that feed 100 people besides his family of 9. At that rate, no more than 2 percent of the population need to farm in order to feed the entire country.

This system is perfect, as it doesn't require any weeding.

The myth of constant carrying capacity

The �carrying capacity' used to estimate how many people a piece of land or the earth as a whole can support is usually assumed to be a constant. But that's a myth, because it depends on how the land is used. Small family farms run on agroecological principles are 2 to 10 times more productive than large mechanised monocultures [28. 29], and at least ten times more energy efficient [30].

In recent years, African farmers all along the edge of the Sahara, in Nigeria, Niger, Senegal, Burkina Faso and Kenya, have been pushing back the desert and turning the hills green [31], simply by integrating crops and livestock to enhance nutrient recycling, by mix-cropping to increase biodiversity, and reintroducing traditional water-conservation methods to overcome drought. Yields of many crops have tripled or doubled, keeping well ahead of population increases.

In some areas, the population density and hence carrying capacity went up fivefold, with the land far more productive than ever before.

More exciting examples of sustainable farming practices will be forthcoming from Sue Edwards and Bob Orskov.

GM-Free Europe

In conclusion, the evidence is as decisively against GM crops as it is in favour of genuinely sustainable agricultural practices. The complete dossier of evidence is contained in the Independent Science Report [32], The Case for a GM-Free Sustainable World , released here today in English, French and Spanish. The German translation is on the ISP website, and Chinese, Portuguese and Indonesian translations are on the way.

Based on such overwhelming evidence, the rational course of action now is to go for a GM-Free Europe, and shift comprehensively to non-GM sustainable agriculture as a matter of urgency, especially as abrupt climate change is happening, and there will be no way to feed the world other than sustainable agriculture, if we are to avoid the worst consequences, as Teddy will tell us.

We reject [33] the biotech Eurovision promoted in the paper, �Plants for the future� [34] that the European Commission has put out in collaboration with the biotech industry. It is a massive abuse of science and misuse of taxpayers' money that will obstruct Europe from delivering food security and health to all. To really do so, and to ameliorate the worst excesses of climate change, Europe needs to invest seriously instead in sustainable non-GM agriculture right now.

References

1. James C. Global review of commercialized transgenic crops: International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Application , 2004 http://www.isaaa.org/
2. FAOSTAT www.app.fao.org/
3. �GM research collapses in UK as last big firm quits�, Geoffrey Lean The Independent on Sunday , 04 July 2004.
4. David P. Hamilton, "Biotech's Dismal Bottom Line: More Than $40 Billion in Losses: As Scientists Search for Cures, They Gobble Investor Cash; A Handful Hit the Jackpot - 'The Ultimate Roulette Game'", Wall Street Journal , 20 May 2004, www.mindfully.org/GE/2004/Biotech-$40B-Losses20may04.htm , http://www.biotech.wisc.edu/seebiotech/seemail/052404#110
5. Ho MW. Living with the Fluid Genome , ISIS and TWN, London & Penang, 2003.
6. Collonier C, Berthier G, Boyer F, Duplan M-N, Fernandez S, Kebdani N, Kobilinsky A, Romanuk M, Bertheau Y. Characterization of commercial GMO inserts: a source of useful material to study genome fluidity. Poster presented at ICPMB: International Congress for Plant Molecular Biology (n°VII), Barcelona, 23-28th June 2003. Poster courtesy of Pr. Gilles-Eric Seralini, Président du Conseil Scientifique du CRII-GEN, www.crii-gen.org ; also �Transgenic lines proven unstable� by Mae-Wan Ho, ISIS Report, 23 October 2003 www.i-sis.org.uk
7. �French experts very disturbed by health effects of Monsanto GM corn� GMWatch www.gmwatch.org 23 April 2004.
8. �Filipino islanders blame GM crop for mystery sickness. Monsanto denies scientist's claim that maize may have caused 100 villagers to fall ill� John Aglionby in Kalyong, southern Philippines, The Guardian , Wednesday 3 March 3, 2004 http://www.guardian.co.uk/gmdebate/Story/0,2763,1160789,00
9. Traavik, T. Lecture to Special Biosafety Genok and TWN Seminar, 22 February, Kuala Lumpur, and personal communication.
10. �Despite ban, agriculturists can't stop farmers from planting Bt corn�, Allen Estabillo, Minda News 23 April 2004 http://www.mindanews.com/2004/04/23nws-btcorn
11. Ho MW and Burcher S. Cows ate GM maize and died. Science in Society 2004, 21, 4-6.
12. El Estado espanol retirara un OGM a instancias de la UE. El maiz Bt 176 podria provoca resistencias a los antibioticos, GARA, Spain
    http://www.gara.net/orriak/P27042004/art79966.htm
13. Pusztai A, Bardocz S and Ewen SWB. Genetically modified foods: Potential human health effects. In Food Safety: Contaminants and Toxins , (J P F D'Mello ed.),
    Scottish Agricultural College, Edinburgh, CAB International, 2003.
14. Fares NH and El-Sayed AK. Fine structural changes in the ileum of mice fed on d endotoxin-treated potatotes and transgenic potatoes. Natural Toxins , 1998, 6, 219-33; also �Bt is toxic� by Joe Cummins and Mae-Wan Ho, ISIS News 7/8, February 2001, ISSN: 1474-1547 (print), ISSN: 1474-1814 (online) www.i-sis.org.uk
15. Novotny E. Animals avoid GM food, for good reasons. Science in Society 2004, 21, 9-11.
16. Ho MW. Mice prefer non-GM. Science in Society 2002, 13/14, 24.
17. Ho MW and Hooper M. Health and the fluid genome series, Science in Society 2003, 19, 22-37.
18. Ho MW. Diet trumping genes. Science in Society 2003, 20, 38-39.
19. Ho MW. Caring mothers reduce response to stress for life. ISIS report 7 September 2004; also Science in Society 2004, 24 (in press).
20. Ho MW. The Rainbow and the Worm, The Physics of Organisms , World Scientific, Singapore, 1993, 2 nd ed. 1998, reprinted 1999, 2001, 2003 (available online from ISIS website www.i-sis.org.uk
21. Ho MW. On the nature of sustainable economic systems. World Futures 1997, 51, 199-221.
22. Ho MW. Are sustainable economic systems like organisms? In Evolution, Development and Economics (P. Koslowski, ed.), Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 1998.
23. Ho MW. Energy, productivity and biodiversity. Science in Society 2004, 21, 48-49.
24. Thrupp LA. World Resources Institute, Washington DC, 1998.
25. Tilman D, Reich PB, Knops J, Wedin D, Mielke T and Lehman C. Diversity and productivity in a long-term grassland experiment. Science 2001, 294, 843-5.
26. Ho MW. Biodiverse systems two to three times more productive. Science in Society 2002, 13/14, 36-37.
27. Ho MW. One bird ten thousand treasures. Science in Society 2004, 23, 17-18.

Other Reading Material

1. Rosset P. On the Benefits of Small Farms. Food First- Backgrounder. Oakland, CA. 2002.
2. Altieri MA. Agroecology versus Ecoagriculture. ISIS Report (to appear).
3. Ho MW. Genetic Engineering Dream or Nightmare? Final chapter, Third World Network, Gateway, Penang & Bath, 1998; 2 nd edition, Gill & Macmillan & Continuum, Dublin & New York, 1999.
4. Pearce F. Desert harvest. New Scientist 27 October 2000, 44-7.
5. Ho MW, Lim LC et al. The Case for a GM-Free Sustainable World . Independent Science Panel Report, ISIS & TWN, 2003 www.indsp.org.uk
6. �Plants for the future�: a 2025 vision for European plant biotechnology, News alert 24 June 2004, http://europa.eu.int/comm/research/press/2004/pr2406-2en.cfm
7. Gala R. Beware the new biotech Eurovision. ISIS Report (to appear).