- Frankenfoods And Biodevastation:
- Genetically-Engineered Crops Sow Seeds Of Discontent
-
- By Janet Allen <janetplanet1@earthlink.net
- c. 2000 All Rights Reserved
-
-
-
- "When health is absent, wisdom cannot reveal itself,
art cannot manifest, strength cannot fight, wealth becomes useless and
reason becomes powerless"
- Herophiles, 300 B.C.
- Physician to Alexander the Great
-
- FACT: 2 out of every 3 teaspoons of food now sold in
- our supermarkets contain genetically engineered
- organisms (GEO's) or ingredients
-
- FACT: The United States government requires no safety
- testing or labeling of genetically altered foods
-
- FACT: The Food and Drug Administration's own staff
- scientists have reported that these foods are
- likely to contain high concentrations of plant
- toxins
-
-
- This article is a continuation on the subject of two
previous columns published in the California Sun: In the February/March
1998 issue, we investigated the development and manipulation of canola
as a food crop, learned how it was incorporated into the human diet on
a grand commercial scale, and researched claims about some negative health
effects not generally publicized. In the June 1998 issue, we explored additional
scientific and medical research along these lines, as well as watching
how biotechnology and genetic modification had succeeded in extending their
greedy tentacles into almost every imaginable crevice of the world's food
supply. We will now delve deeper into the matter of genetically engineered
organisms (GEO's) and the irreverent push by corporations to force them
down the throats of an unwilling public.
-
-
- LAYING DOWN THE LAW OF THE LAND
-
- "The FDA is trying to fit a square peg into a round
hole by trying to force an ultimate conclusion that there is no difference
between foods modified by genetic engineering and foods modified by traditional
breeding practices."
-
- Dr. Linda Kalb, FDA compliance officer
-
- When we left off, the battle over the labeling and safety
testing of biotech foods had reached a new level of intensity in the United
States when a coalition of 31 highly visible environmental, farming, and
scientific organizations filed a formal legal petition to the Environmental
Protection Agency on September 16, 1997. Groups including Greenpeace,
the Sierra Club, the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements
(IFOAM), and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy charged the
federal agency with gross negligence over its approval of genetically engineered
crops, calling for their removal from the market, as well as fundamental
changes in the U.S.'s presently lax regulatory laws governing these agricultural
products. In a resounding shot over the bow of the biotech establishment
and the Clinton administration, attorneys from the International Center
for Technology Assessment (ICTA) filed a comprehensive lawsuit on behalf
of consumers, scientists, environmentalists, chefs, and religious groups
to force the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to require mandatory labeling
and adequate safety testing of all genetically engineered foods and crops.
The lawsuit was announced at a well-attended press conference in Washington,
D.C. on May 27, 1998.
-
- According to Andrew Kimbrell, Executive Director of ICTA
and co-counsel on the case, "The FDA has placed interests of a handful
of biotechnology companies ahead of their responsibility to protect public
healthThe agency has made consumers unknowing guinea pigs for potentially
harmful, unregulated substances. According to ICTA attorney Joseph Mendelsohn,
current FDA and USDA labeling policies not only ignore public surveys concluding
that upwards of 93% of American consumers want mandatory labeling of GEO's
(per Novartis national poll, February 1997), but also blatantly contradict
federal laws. For example, the "Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act mandates
the labeling of "materially altered foods such as those exposed to
nuclear radiation, a law devastated by endless loopholes and blatant disregard.
Regardless, the law's existence (along with consistent grassroots campaigning)
has all but spoiled the commercialization of food irradiation in this country.
-
-
- A RUSE BY ANY OTHER NAME
-
- "Our government, that is supposed to be a protector
of our well-being and of our food supply, is at least criminally negligent
and perhaps a co-conspirator on this assault on our food supply, making
us all unwitting, unknowing guinea pigs in this global nutritional experiment,
which is bound to have and is already having severe health and environmental
consequences." John Hagelin, Nuclear Physicist & Presidential
Candidate
-
- As Monsanto and the Clinton Administration understand
full well, mandatory labeling is the "Achilles Heel of agricultural
biotechnology. It would almost certainly radically reduce the profitability
of gene foods, or even drive controversial products such rBGH (recombinant
Bovine Growth Hormone), Roundup Ready Soybeans, and Bt (Bacillus Thuringiensis
bacteria)-spliced corn and potatoes (all Monsanto products) from the marketplace.
As the head of Asgrow seed company (a Monsanto subsidiary) candidly admitted
to the press several years ago: "Labeling is a key issue. If you
put a label on genetically engineered food, you might as well put a skull
and crossbones on it.
-
- On another important note, ICTA's lawsuit calls attention
to the fact that current "no labeling policies constitute a violation
of many Americans, spiritual and religious beliefs, posing a significant
threat to religious freedom and ethical choice. As Mendelsohn stated in
the April 1998 issue of GeneWatch (published by the Council for Responsible
Genetics), labeling is being demanded by "practitioners of a wide
variety of religious denominations that may have a constitutional right
to avoid consuming genetically engineered organisms based on theological
belief or adherence to specific dietary covenants. Segments of the population
including Jews, Muslims, Seventh-Day Adventists, and vegetarians need to
avoid foods which contain substances derived from animals, whose genes
are currently being inserted into the DNA of numerous vegetable and grain
crops. (Genetic material from pigs has been inserted into spinach, human
genes into pigs, chicken genes into potatoes, fish genes into tomatoes,
firefly genes into tobacco, and bacteria and virus genes into numerous
crops.) A considerable cross-section of consumers view the production of
genetically engineered foods to be incompatible with proper stewardship
of the integrity of God's creation. Regardless, since 1993, the U.S. government
has allowed at least 37 biotech foods onto the market. Altogether, more
than 678 gene-altered crops have been field-tested by dozens of companies.
In a New York Times article on July 20th, 1998, Marion Burrows sums it
up: "American shoppers would be surprised to know that much of the
food that they buy has genetically engineered ingredients. For example,
soybean derivatives (ie. lecithin, soya oils, hydrolyzed proteins, soy
isolates, etc.) may be contained in as many as 85% of all processed food
items. For further information on the lawsuit, access the ICTA homepage
at: www.icta.org.
-
- BLUE GENES
-
- "If you reach out and grab a hold of some part of
nature and give it a little tug, you discover that that part is connected
to everything else in the Universe." John Muir, Environmentalist,
Naturist
-
- A growing number of doctors, micro-biologists, genetic
experts, and even legislators are jumping on the international bandwagon,
greatly concerned about the potentially devastating effects of tampering
with, rearranging, and attempting to fool Mother Nature. A variety of
field and medical research has already demonstrated some of their apprehensions
to be true.
-
- In addition to exclusively human-centered concerns such
as adverse health reactions, there could be a severe ecological legacy
of this out-of-control technology: the rampant, uncontrollable biological
pollution of the environment, irreversible reduction of the diversity of
the world's most significant food crops, and an upsetting of the balance
of numerous irreplaceable ecosystems. Once lost, always lost.
-
- Case after case of undeniable evidence is rolling in
all over the globe. In March 1999, experts at an international meeting
of entomologists (insect scientists) in Basel, Switzerland warned that
genetically engineered Bt crops are exuding 10-20 times the amount of toxins
contained in the conventional (safe) Bt sprays commonly used by organic
farmers. As a result, beneficial insects (such as ladybugs and lacewings),
soil microorganisms, and insect-eating bird populations are being harmed.
The scientists' call for a moratorium would involve stopping the biotech
wrecking ball in mid-swing, as 28% of all GE crops under cultivation in
1998 contained this Bt bacteria (19.3 million acres), including 45% of
U.S. cotton, 25% of the corn, and 3.5% of the potatoes.
-
- An entire article could be written just on the potential
dangers of transgenic foods to physiological well-being, but Dr. Lee Hitchcox,
chiropractor and author of "Long Life Now, has summed up the situation
quite succinctly in his well-researched, thoroughly footnoted book. "The
first gene-altered food for sale in the U.S. (Calgene's Flavr Savr Tomato)
contains a marker gene that confers resistance to the antibiotic kanamycin.
The FDA admits that antibiotic-resistant genes can reduce the benefit of
prescribed antibiotics. Mixing genes could increase pesticide use if resistance
is transferred to nearby weeds. Virus genes can recombine with other viruses
to create more virulent strains. EMS (eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome), the
disease responsible for 38 deaths and 1,500 injuries from the use of tryptophan,
was caused by genetically-altered bacteria. A second biotech accident
has also occurred: researchers inadvertently transferred brazil nut genes
containing an allergen into soybeans.
-
- Another major GE food safety controversy erupted in the
UK on March 12, 1999 when researchers at the York Nutritional Laboratory
announced that soy food allergies among the British public unexpectedly
rose 50% in 1998, coinciding with a large increase in imported foods from
the U.S. containing genetically engineered soybeans. At that time, Monsanto's
Roundup Ready soybeans constituted 32% of this country's entire crop.
For years, scientists have warned that never-before-consumed foreign proteins
gene-spliced into common foods could set off an epidemic of allergies.
Eight percent of American children, and 2% of adults, already suffer from
mild to severe food sensitivities, with symptoms ranging from mild unpleasantness
to sudden death. British biotech expert Mae-Won Ho of the Open University,
stated in a legal affidavit (August 1998) that Monsanto's RRS soybeans
"contain genes from a virus, a soil bacterium and from a petunia (plant),
none of which have been in our food beforeThe soil bacterium, Agrobacterium
sp. (CP4EPSPS)is unlike any other protein that humans have eaten, and there
is no reliable method for predicting its allergenic potential. Allergic
reactions typically occur only some time after the subject is sensitized
by initial exposure to the allergen."
-
-
- THE BIOTECH BANDWAGON
-
- "Wisdom is the ability to make retrospective judgements
prospectively." Jonas Salk
-
- Health, ecology, and consumer advocate organizations
such as the ORGANIC CONSUMERS ASSOCIATION, the BIODEMOCRACY CAMPAIGN (formerly
the CAMPAIGN FOR FOOD SAFETY), and FOOD AND WATER know big business too
well to buy all the hype or trust the glib tongue and pat-on-the-back approach
of their slick public relations and propaganda machines which claim there
is nothing to worry about. A stunning array of European and other international
groups are impressively linking arms on this issue, uniting in disapproval
and fear of the implications, and displaying a hearty cynicism toward corporate
claims that genetic manipulation is not only safe, but a panacea for world
hunger.
-
- The British government's own wildlife advisors English
Nature, that country's biggest landowner The National Trust, their giant
supermarket chain Sainsbury's, and a number of major UK fast-food restaurants
(McDonald's, Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken) have all stepped up to
the plate. Also jumping on the anti-GE bandwagon are Germany's Deutsche
Bank (the world's largest financial institution) and huge Unilever food
conglomerate, the Church of Scotland, the Consumers Union of Japan, hundreds
of whole foods manufacturers and retailers (such as Archer-Daniels-Midland,
the grain/soybean giant, Danish Carlsberg Beer), and a tidal wave of guilds,
associations, institutes, ecology and consumer groups are surfing the wave
of opposition. In addition, European Union nations with partial or comprehensive
bans on growing or importing GEO crops include France, England, Spain,
Denmark, Austria (now declared a bio-tech free zone), Greece, Luxembourg,
Hungary and Norway. As of May 1999, the Union suspended approval completely
for all such crops, while in February the European Parliament demanded
labeling of all genetically altered foods, with a ban on the use of antibiotic-resistant
marker genes. The governments of Japan (as of April 2001), India, Australia
and New Zealand have set national regulations for mandatory labeling, while
those of South Korea, Malaysia, and Chile are beginning to develop these
standards or are drafting national biosafety legislation.
-
-
- RESISTANCE INTENSIFIES
-
- In July 1998, North America's "First Grassroots
Gathering on Biodevastation, held in Milwaukee, Chicago, and St. Louis,
attracted 250 U.S. activists, as well as campaigners from Japan, Europe,
India, Canada, and Mexico. They attended spirited meetings and workshops
designed to begin building a mass movement against GEO's and the globalization
and industrialization of agriculture. The week of strategy sessions was
highlighted by a keynote address in St. Louis by Dr. Vandana Shiva of India,
as well as a "round-up of 150 protestors in front of Monsanto's St.
Louis world headquarters. The gatherings were sponsored by a broad coalition
of public interest groups including the Green Party USA, Greenpeace, the
Organic Consumers Association, the Campaign for Food Safety (CFS), Sustain,
the Edmonds Institute, and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy,
among others.
-
- The leadership stressed the importance of building truly
mass-based consumer, farmer, and environmental campaigns worldwide to derail
the Biotech Express and to promote sustainable and organic agriculture.
It became all too evident that America--land of the free, home of the
brave"was displaying more "land of the lazy, home of the apathetic
qualities and lagging sorely behind the rest of the planet in terms of
getting organized. According to Brian Tokar, one of the St. Louis coordinators,
"We need a powerful political movement in the U.S. to counter the
lies and propaganda of the biotechnology industry. Similarly, Ronnie Cummins
addressed the opening plenary at that city's gathering with the challenge,
"To fully inform and arouse the American public, to force the mass
media to cover the genetically engineered foods controversy, it will be
necessary to build a mass grassroots movement comparable to what we,ve
built before"Civil Rights, the anti-war movement, the anti-nuclear
movement." Participants in all three cities endorsed the call for
a coordinated global citizen effort, including the annual Global Days of
Action, which is held in over 100 cities and towns and two dozen nations,
involving events such as "Frankenfood dumps, picket lines, and press
conferences.
-
- Follow-up "Biodevestation" conferences have
since been held in India (March 1999) and Seattle (May 1999), which coincided
with an annual convention of America's trade associations of GE corporations.
Both attracted leading scientists and activists from over a dozen nations.
-
- CANOLA COVERUP
-
- The genetic modification of agricultural commodities
is almost exclusively a money-making venture, although claims are to the
opposite. Regardless of blatant public opposition, farmers, food processors,
and multinational pharmaceutical/chemical companies are plowing their biotech
steamroller right through the kitchens of those keeping them in business.
Bruce Dalgarno, President of the Canadian Canola Growers Association,
in a press release dated April 18, 1997, noted that both "the CCGA
and grower group boards have passed motions supporting the development
of novel trait canola, including herbicide-resistant varieties," and
they are actively providing guidance to government and corporate scientists.
-
- Brian Tokar, a Harvard biophysicist, author, and Food
and Water's Biotechnology Consultant, points to one sure indicator that
behind the corporate, well-intentioned, Cheshire cat humanitarian facade
crouches a beast of purely economic incentive: "For years, the $50
billion biotechnology industry has claimed that their new genetic technologies
are going to feed the world, relieve population pressures, cure all the
deadliest diseases, etc. The reality, unfortunately, is very different
...The single most popular area of research has been for chemical companies
to try to engineer crops that are resistant to their own brand of herbicide."
True enough when it comes to canola. Monsanto and Hoechst/AgrEvo are
both experimenting with varieties that would be able to withstand high
doses of two deadly weed killers: Glufosinate and Glyphosate. Bacteria
genes would be inserted into Hoechst's variety to achieve this result.
Along the same lines, Calgene's "Laurical" canola (approved for
sale by the USDA and FDA in 1995 for use in soap and food products) has
been shot up with bacteria and virus genes as well, in addition to California
bay, turnip, and rape.
-
- Greenpeace's Benedikt Haerlin is convinced that an all-out
ban of GEO's is our one saving grace. "Regulators around the world
are well aware of the problems but have not dared to draw the necessary
conclusions. Instead, they have agreed to the thoroughly inadequate voluntary
resistance management, presented by the chemical industry. A severe shortage
of legislation demanding government regulatory and enforcement agencies,
strict fines, and codes of ethics has all too often left the fox guarding
the hen house in numerous enterprises, inviting widespread neglect and
abuse of potentially harmful technologies. The corporate "Hall of
Shame within the food irradiation industry is lengthy enough to fill a
roll of toilet paper, and there's little chance of wiping that slate clean
when it comes to the biotech bulletin board. Already, the evidence of
dangerous carelessness has started to roll in, with canola topping the
bill. On April 18, 1997, the St. Louis POST-DISPATCH carried the story
(only 84 words long, under a confusing headline, and buried deep in a news
wrap-up column on the business page) of Monsanto's discreet recall of "small
quantities of a genetically engineered canola seed containing an unapproved
gene that had gotten into the product by mistake. However, Canadian government
officials claimed the amount was not small, as 60,000 bag units of two
different varieties (sufficient to seed some 60,000 to 750,000 acres of
land) had to be retrieved. Some had already been planted when Monsanto
discovered the error, which apparently had gone undetected for a substantial
period of time.
-
- The recalled "Roundup Ready canola was genetically
manipulated to withstand increased spraying with Monsanto's billion-dollar
herbicide, glyphosate, marketed under the trade name Roundup. This agricultural
wonder product is responsible for a large proportion of the chemical giant's
annual profits, being utilized by farmers and backyard gardeners alike
to kill weeds. (Statistics show this poison is also a leading cause of
illness among landscape and agricultural workers.) Ordinarily, it is so
lethal to the plants that it must be used more sparingly, but Monsanto,
with its eye on boosting sales, found a way to alter the DNA of various
seed crops to create an unnatural tolerance of the herbicide. Now, canola,
soybeans, and cotton can withstand a good dousing with many times the usual
dose. That heavy residue is then passed on to those consuming the plants
or their derivatives (such as soya lecithin, textured/hydrolyzed vegetable
protein, or cottonseed and canola oils).
-
- Inserting the wrong gene configuration into a commercial
product is precisely the kind of catastrophe that opponents have been predicting
for a decade. Despite proponent's insistence that such mistakes could never
happen due to rigorous quality-assurance programs and tight government
regulations, this incident proves a more threatening scenario: That the
system is a failure and our safety is at risk. If this could happen in
Canada, where stricter controls are in place, it could definitely occur
in the United States at some future date. Limagrain Canada Seeds, Inc.
of Saskatchewan, who was selling the canola seeds under license, appeared
to blame Monsanto squarely for the mistake. (Pass the buck, please) Company
spokesperson Gary Bauman explained that only Monsanto, who possesses the
expertise to detect genetic differences, could have discovered the apparent
contamination. In addition, tracing the exact origin of the error would
have been difficult that late in the game, because the seeds available
for testing after the fact were progeny (offspring) of the originals.
"We may never know how it happened. Small comfort from the scientific
experts we are asked to trustwith our food, with our health, with our lives,
with our future.
-
- Critics and watchdogs of the speeding-out-of-control
biotech and genetic engineering industries have long felt that they are
disasters waiting to happen. Aldous Huxley forecast problems in his 1932
book BRAVE NEW WORLD, while Erwin Chargoff (eminent biochemist and Father
of molecular biology) categorized such technologies as a "Molecular
Auschwitz. In his book HERACLITEAN FIRE, he notes the "awesome irreversibility
of genetic experimentation and warns that this technology poses a greater
threat than the advent of nuclear science. He writes, "I have the
feeling that science has transgressed a barrier that should have remained
inviolate. You cannot recall a new form of life.
-
- WHAT CAN ONE PERSON DO?
-
- He warned that "tyranny of the majority" would
put great pressure on
- people to act like everyone else. As a result, democracy
would tend to
- smother individuality and personal freedom.
- "If you want to touch an American company's heart,
you must touch its
- pocketbook." Alexis de Tocqueville,
- 19th century French historian
-
- 1. Call the 15 companies listed below"the Frankenfoods
Fifteen"
- -and tell them you will not purchase their foods or beverages
unless
- they can provide you with written assurance that their
products do not
- contain genetically engineered ingredients.
-
- Safeway: 800-723-3929
- Frito-Lay: 800-352-4477
- Kellogg's: 800-962-1413
- Nestle: 800-452-1971
- Heinz Foods: 888-472-8437
- Healthy Choice: 800-323-9980
- Kraft: 800-543-5335
- Hershey's: 800-468-1714
- Coca-Cola: 800-438-2653
- Nabisco: 800-862-2638
- Quaker Oats: 800-367-6287
- Starbucks: 800-782-7282
- McDonald's: 630-623-3000
- General Mills: 800-328-1144
- Procter and Gamble: 800-595-1407
-
- 2. The California Right To Know/ Genetically Engineered
Food Labeling Initiative has been written to acknowledge the funda-mental
right of people to be informed whether the foods they purchase and consume
have been genetically engineered. As discussed previously, there are a
variety of personal ethical and medical considerations that make this information
necessary. Apparently the public thinks so, too; surveys show that 81
- 93% of the American public already supports labeling of GEO's. However,
it has become obvious that safety testing and labeling won't happen unless
we demand it.
-
- The intent of the intitiative's proponents is to place
this issue at the forefront of public debate in the U.S. It does not make
a case for or against genetic engineering; it asserts, in deliberately
simple language, that the public has a right to know which foods and crops
have been genetically manipulated and requires that they be labeled as
such. It states that "historical breeding techniques such as hybridization
through mass selection, controlled crossing, line breeding, and back crossing"
are not considered to be genetic engineering by this proposed law.
-
- This is an all-volunteer effort. No money taken, no
PACs. This initiative will pass or fail on its own merits, and on the strength
of our efforts. Over 413,000 valid signatures need to be collected by
the February 20, 2000 deadline, which means gathering at least 600,000
to ensure there are enough. If you work for or belong to any organization,
please get them involved.
-
- If you wish to participate, make copies of this initiative
and proceed to gather signatures. It is CRITICAL the petitions be filled
out properly, so please visit the group's website www.calrighttoknow.org
and follow the "Instructions for Petition Circulators." You
may also contact the organization at: P.O. Box 520, Glen Ellen, CA 95442
(707) 939-8316 E-mail: info@calrighttoknow.org
-
- *******
-
- For more information, please contact:
- BIODEMOCRACY CAMPAIGN: (310) 399-9355; (218) 226-4164
- Website: www.purefood.org
- To subscribe to their free electronic newsletter,
- BioDemocracy News, send an email to: majordomo@mr.net
- Type the simple message: "subscribe pure-food-action"
-
- ORGANIC CONSUMERS ASSOCIATION: (218) 726-1443
- Website: www.organicconsumers.org
- To subscribe to their free electronic newsletter,
- Organic View, email: organicview@organicconsumers.org
- Type the message "subscribe" in the body
of the text.
-
- TEN SPEED PRESS (Dr. Lee Hitchcox): (800) 841-BOOK
-
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