Genetically modified food benefit both farmers and consumers Essay

THE TERM GM FOODS OR GMOS (GENETICALLY-MODIFIED ORGANISMS) IS MOST commonly used to refer to crop plants created for human or animal consumption using the latest molecu- lar biology techniques. These plants have been modified in the laboratory to enhance de- sired traits such as increased resistance to herbicides or improved nutritional content. The enhancement of desired traits has traditionally been undertaken through breeding, but conventional plant breeding methods can be very time consuming and are often not very accurate. Genetic engineering, on the other hand, can create plants with the exact desired trait very rapidly and with great accuracy. For example, plant geneticists can isolate a gene responsible for drought tolerance and insert that gene into a different plant. The new genetically-modified plant will gain drought tolerance as well. Not only can genes be transferred from one plant to another, but genes from non-plant organisms also can be used. The best known example of this is the use of B. t. genes in corn and other crops. B. t. , or Bacillus thuringiensis, is a naturally occurring bacterium that produces crystal proteins that are lethal to insect larvae. B. t. crystal protein genes have been transferred into corn, enabling the corn to produce its own pesticides against insects such as the European corn borer. For two informative overviews of some of the techniques involved in creating GM foods, visit Biotech Basics (sponsored by Monsanto) http://www. biotechknowledge. monsanto. com/biotech/bbasics. nsf/index or Techniques of Plant Biotechnology from the National Center for Biotechnology Education http://www. ncbe. reading. ac. uk/NCBE/GMFOOD/techniques. 1 Transgenic pollen harms monarch larvae (Nature, Vol 399, No 6733, p 214, May 20, 1999) 2 Assessing the impact of Cry1Ab-expressing corn pollen on monarch butterfly larvae in field studies (Pro- ceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol 98, No 21, p11931-11936, Oct 2001) 3  © 2000 CSA What are some of the advantages of GM foods? The world population has topped 6 billion people and is predicted to double in the next 50 years. Ensuring an adequate food supply for this booming population is going to be a major challenge in the years to come. GM foods promise to meet this need in a number of ways: †¢ Pest resistance Crop losses from insect pests can be staggering, resulting in devastat- ing financial loss for farmers and starvation in developing countries. Farmers typi- cally use many tons of chemical pesticides annually. Consumers do not wish to eat food that has been treated with pesticides because of potential health hazards, and run-off of agricultural wastes from excessive use of pesticides and fertilizers can poi- son the water supply and cause harm to the environment. Growing GM foods such as B. t. corn can help eliminate the application of chemical pesticides and reduce the cost of bringing a crop to market. 4,5 †¢ Herbicide tolerance For some crops, it is not cost-effective to remove weeds by physi- cal means such as tilling, so farmers will often spray large quantities of different her- bicides (weed-killer) to destroy weeds, a time-consuming and expensive process, that requires care so that the herbicide does not harm the crop plant or the environment. Crop plants genetically-engineered to be resistant to one very powerful herbicide could help prevent environmental damage by reducing the amount of herbicides needed. For example, Monsanto has created a strain of soybeans genetically modified to be not affected by their herbicide product Roundup  ®. 6 A farmer grows these soy- beans which then only require one application of weed-killer instead of multiple ap- plications, reducing production cost and limiting the dangers of agricultural waste run-off. 7 †¢ Disease resistance There are many viruses, fungi and bacteria that cause plant diseases. Plant biologists are working to create plants with genetically-engineered resistance to these diseases. 8,9 †¢ Cold tolerance Unexpected frost can destroy sensitive seedlings. An antifreeze gene from cold water fish has been introduced into plants such as tobacco and potato. With this antifreeze gene, these plants are able to tolerate cold temperatures that normally 4 Insecticidal proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis protect corn from corn rootworms (Nature Biotechnol- ogy, Vol 19, No 7, pp 668-672, Jul 2001). 5 Lepidopteran-resistant transgenic plants (US Patent 6313378, Nov 2001, Monsanto) Conclusion We must by with Genetically-modified foods have the potential to solve many of the world’s hunger and malnutrition problems, and to help protect and preserve the environment by increasing yield and reducing reliance upon chemical pesticides and herbicides. Yet there are many challenges ahead for governments, especially in the areas of safety testing, regulation, international policy and food labeling. Many people feel that genetic engineering is the inevitable wave of the future and that we cannot afford to ignore a technology that has such enormous potential benefits. However, we must proceed with caution to avoid causing unintended harm to human health and the environment as a result of our enthusiasm for this powerful technology.