Plant Biotech Blog

GMO Africa Blog
March 27, 2007

Every time I write an article to pillory anti-technology activists for misrepresenting and misreporting modern agricultural biotechnology – I author GMO Africa Blog - I am branded an apologist for multinational biotech companies. Criticism against me usually intensifies when I demand that African farmers be allowed to cultivate genetically modified crops. Some of my critics contend that Africa is awash with food and the only problem is that there isn’t proper infrastructure to distribute it. My question has always been, “Why have Americans embraced modern agricultural biotechnology, yet they have the best roads, rail tracks and airfields?”

My critics are ill-informed and out of touch with reality. Most have never visited Africa. Their knowledge of Africa comes from watching the Discovery Channel or reading National Geographic Magazine. Africa and the West are like heaven and earth. They’re totally different. Africa is wracked in poverty, while the West swims in abundant wealth. American farmers smile all the way to the bank, while African farmers can’t even grow enough to feed their families.

To illustrate the disparities that exist between these two worlds, I invite you to watch these two videos appearing on Conversations About Plant Biotechnology website. One features Ouoba Issiaka, a Malian farmer explaining his experience with genetically modified cotton. The other features Jay Hardwick, a U.S. farmer with about ten years of experience growing genetically modified cotton, corn, and soybeans. The faces of these two men tell it all. The Malian farmer is evidently poor, while his American counterpart looks contented. My question is, “Why not give the Malian farmer leeway to experiment on what his American colleague considers a standard farming practice?

Associated Press via Yahoo News
By PAUL ELIAS, AP Biotechnology Writer
March 21, 2007

Excerpt…

SAN FRANCISCO - Biotechnology was first applied in medicine, then farming. Today, dozens of lifesaving drugs are on the market, while many crops are genetically engineered to withstand weed killers.

Now, a 2-year-old push to develop alternative fuels is driving biotechnology’s growth into the industrial sector.

Thousands of corporate executives and scientists gather this weekend in Orlando, Fla. for an industry trade show specifically aimed at touting biotechnology’s so-called third wave, industrial applications. The word on everyone’s lips: ethanol.

After decades of unfulfilled promise and billions in government corn subsidies, energy companies may finally be able to produce ethanol easily and inexpensively thanks to breakthroughs in biotechnology.

Most of the 5 billion gallons of ethanol produced annually in the United States is still made by fermenting corn, but the crop is expensive and its use in biofuels cuts into the nation’s food supply. So the Canadian biotech company Iogen Corp. has developed a method for deriving ethanol from a variety of plants including wheat, oats and barley. Others are genetically engineering microbes to produce enzymes that will convert the cellulose in crop waste, wood chips and other plants into ethanol.

President Bush helped breathe new life into this once-sleepy biotech sector by touting the need to ramp up production of this “cellulosic ethanol” in his last two State of the Union speeches.

The president wants to reduce the country’s oil consumption by 20 percent within 10 years and he sees alternative fuels as the way to get there. Bush visited the North Carolina biotechnology company Novozymes Inc. last month to underscore the industry’s vital role in accomplishing that ambitious goal.

Government agencies led by the Department of Energy are sinking millions into biotech projects aimed at making ethanol more efficiently. And startups dedicated to turning plants into fuel have captured the fancy of deep-pocketed venture capitalists like Vinod Khosla. The billionaire co-founder of Sun Microsystems Inc. is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in green technology and will be a featured speaker this year at the World Congress on Industrial Biotechnology & Bioprocessing.

Other heavy hitters attending the conference include University of California scientist Jay Keasling, Discover magazine’s Scientist of the Year in 2006 and a leader in the burgeoning “synthetic biology” field, which aims to create living species that will spit out drugs and fuel.

Oil companies are also investing heavily in biotechnology these days, and executives from ConocoPhillips Co., Chevron Corp. and Shell Oil Corp. will also be on hand at Walt Disney World for the conference, which starts Thursday.

By contrast, these annual gatherings have historically been sleepy affairs. Last year’s industrial biotech meeting, sponsored by the Biotechnology Industry Organization, drew little interest even though it was held in Hawaii in January. That state’s lieutenant governor may have been the biggest draw.

Past conferences have featured discussions on topics like biotech’s role in manufacturing enzymes used to help laundry detergent break down dirt and give blue jeans the stone-washed look. But this year’s meeting will be focused on the industry’s role in making ethanol and other alternative fuels.

The DOE has awarded up to $385 million over four years to six companies to develop ethanol….

Read the full article at Associated Press via Yahoo News.

AgBioWorld
Andrew Apel
March 16, 2007

Excerpt…

“Monsanto Corn Allegedly Toxic,” reads a headline in the March 15 edition of Red Herring. [1] They were beat to press by Britain’s Daily Mail, which proclaimed, “GM corn ‘could cause liver and kidney damage’.” [2]

Underscoring these shrill headlines was the announcement by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) that it would, in the words of FoodNavigator.com, “review the new data presented by French scientists that revealed toxicity concerns in rats fed the MON863 variety of GM maize from Monsanto.” [3]

However, there is no “new data.” It’s old data, which European authorities used in the course of approving the corn for import, feed and processing on August 8, 2005 and again under the Novel Food and Food Ingredient Regulation on January 13, 2006. The data are available online, [4] but beware - the .pdf file is 1,140 pages long.

What, then is new? Merely a reinterpretation of the data, supported by Greenpeace. It, too, is available online. [5] The paper seeks to contradict findings made in 2003 by Germany’s Robert Koch Institut by the EFSA and France’s Commission du Génie Biomoléculaire in 2004 - all based on the same data, and all concluding that the rats were normal and the corn was safe.

In a nutshell, the Greenpeace-backed reinterpretation rests on data which show statistically significant differences in serum protein values or triglycerides mainly in rats fed *low* doses of MON863, but not in rats fed high doses of the corn. It’s generally thought that the dose makes the poison, but in this case high doses showed no discernible effects. Does this truly reveal, as the title of the new paper suggests, “Signs of Hepatorenal Toxicity?” The authors of the paper attempt to explain this by saying, cryptically, “This sex- and dose-related effect resulted in the fact that the growth variations of the 11% GMO males are *highly statistically lower* - than their controls, and 33%-GM fed females higher.”

However you’d like to interpret that, it remains the case that scientists evaluating MON863 rat studies have consistently found the variations occured randomly, were generally of small magnitude, and were within the normal range for laboratory rats.

It is unfortunate that the Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology charge non-subscribers US$32 to read this seven-page paper, since Greenpeace is and others are guiding media perceptions of a paper few have apparently read.

Greenpeace has the option, via the publisher of the paper, to pay a fee to make the paper available free of charge to the public. However, such a move is unlikely. Its conclusion is, essentially, a complaint that “the statistical methods used by Monsanto were not detailed enough to see disruptions in biological parameters.” What is obviously an argument among statisticians would not justify the alarming headlines which this activist group has thus far succeeded in generating….

Read the full article at AgBioWorld.

Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry - Australia (press release)
March 1, 2007

Excerpt…

Australia’s traditional export markets for canola accept genetically modified (GM) canola just as readily as conventional canola - and pay a similar price for both.

Welcoming the release today of the ABARE report Market acceptance of GM canola, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Peter McGauran, said the report found that GM canola was being accepted in markets throughout the world and non-GM canola did not appear to be attracting a price premium.

“Fears about GM canola have proved unfounded and consumers around the world now accept it to be a safe food ingredient. As a result of this, Australian growers of non-GM canola are not receiving any overall premium,” Mr McGauran said.

“The analysis conducted by ABARE concludes there is nothing to support the concerns that unintended presence of GM canola in other grain exports, particularly wheat and barley, would adversely impact on trade.

“As well as debunking the myths of price premiums and the disruption to wheat and barley trade, ABARE has shown there is no basis to the fears expressed that products derived from animals fed GM feed would suffer in the marketplace….

Market acceptance of GM canola can be found on the ABARE website: www.abareconomics.com

Read the full story at Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry - Australia (press release).

Financial Express
Ashok B. Sharma
March 10, 2007

Excerpt…

To promote genetically modified (GM) crops in the country, the government has announced a special subsidy package. The National Horticulture Board in its recent document has announced backed-ended capital investment subsidy for projects developing genetic modified organisms (GMOs) and bio-technology.

The NHB has also proposed similar subsidy for high-density plantations, micro-propogation or tissue culture for mass production of “true-to types”, hi-tech cultivation under controlled climatic conditions like poly-houses, green houses and net-houses, rainfed production through efficient water management techniques, nursery management for quality seed and planning material production, hybrid seed production, organic farming, hydroponics for year-round quality production and for use of plastics in horticulture.

Priority areas have also been defined to include export-oriented units, projects in cooperative sectors, projects in Northeast, and those involving women entrepreneurs. No GM horticulture crops have so far been approved for commercial cultivation, while a number of them are in the pipeline….

Read the full article at Financial Express.

BioPortfolio
March 21, 2007

PARIS (AFX) - The French agriculture ministry said it has authorised 13 field trials for genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in 2007, adding that EU rules on GMOs will be adopted by decree ‘before the end of March’.
The companies who have received licences for this year’s round of trials are Syngenta (nyse: SYT - news - people), Pioneer, Librophyt, Biogemma, Monsanto (nyse: MON - news - people) and BASF (nyse: BF - news - people).

The number of trials compares with 17 in 2006.

The trials will include 12 for maize and one for tobacco. A 14th application, involving a genetically modified potato, was rejected by the Commission du Genie Biomoleculaire (CGB).

The CGB said it received 26,306 comments during a recent public consultation, adding that none caused it to reconsider its approval for the 13 trials.

Separately, the agriculture ministry said the French government will publish decrees before the end of the month in order to write EU rules on GMOs into national law….

Read the full article at BioPortfolio.

Budapest Business Journal
March 15, 2007

Excerpt…

The European Union operates an effective ban on new gene-engineered seeds and risks missing out on the “invisible revolution” that’s developing crops for cleaner fuels or washing detergents, the industry says.

Innovation by companies such as BASF AG and Bayer CropScience AG in developing nutritional changes to corn, plants for use in biofuels as well as food and feed crops that resist drought or disease is changing the market for genetically modified technologies. The EU has yet to approve new seeds for cultivation since lifting a five-year-old embargo in 2004. “The moratorium is still in place because no approvals for cultivation have been given” by European governments, said Hans Kast, CEO of BASF Plant Science.

“We have a go-slow situation in the EU, and the process needs to be accelerated because there’s a long queue of applications,” he said in a telephone interview from Lyon, France. In the last three months, EU governments have refused to strike down Hungarian and Austrian bans on imports of Monsanto Co. and Bayer biotech corn varieties. They also blocked a BASF request to allow farmers to grow a potato genetically modified to boost its starch content, in the first EU vote on permission for planting of a biotech crop in eight years.

In September, the World Trade Organization ruled that the ban was illegal and declined to find the embargo has been lifted. The European Commission, the EU’s executive in Brussels, is trying to persuade governments to drop their opposition to the technology on environmental or human health concerns. While biotech crops were planted in 22 countries last year, generating sales of about €4.66 billion ($6.15 billion) for farmers, just six of the EU’s then 25-nations planted biotech crops in 2006, led by Spain with 60,000 hectares (152,400 acres), the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications said.

Meanwhile US farmers planted three times more biotech crops last year than their counterparts in Argentina, the second-largest user of the technology, according to the January ISAAA report. The area sown with biotech crops rose 13 percent last year, to 102 million hectares, the report said. The organization, which is funded by the biotech industry, predicts that the total area planted with such crops may double to 200 million hectares by 2015. “People don’t realize there’s an invisible revolution going on,” said Bernward Garthoff, chairman of the German Association of Biotech Industries and a board member of Bayer CropScience, the world’s biggest developer of seed protection products….

Read the full article at Budapest Business Journal.

All Headline News
By Richard Bowden
March 16, 2007

Beijing, China — China is expected to increase its spending on agricultural biotechnology almost five fold by 2010 in an attempt to improve food security for its rapidly increasing population the Financial Times reported on Thursday.

China’s population, currently 1.3 billion or twenty percent of the world’s total, is expected to rise to 1.5 billion by 2020. Yet with only seven percent of the world’s arable land, China needs to address the problem of feeding its people.

By increasing its research in genetically modified food products, China hopes to lessen its dependency on other countries for food products such as soy beans.

“The government takes the issue of food security seriously,” said Zhang Liang Chen, president of the Agricultural University of China. “Last year we imported 17m tonnes of soybean from the US, Brazil and Argentina. This dependency could lead to trouble in the future.”

Already accounting for twenty percent of the world’s investment into global research into agricultural biotechnology, the spending is expected to more than quadruple as China attempts to meet soaring food demand….

Read the full article at All Headline News.

GMO Africa
March 19, 2007

Excerpt…

The European Association for Bioindustries has unveiled a Green Biotechnology Manifesto, which spells out the road map for genetically modified organisms (GMOs) adoption in Europe.

Released at a biotechnology gathering in Lyons, France…the manifesto underscores the importance of agricultural or “green” biotechnology to Europe.

It calls on Europe to rethink its stand on agricultural biotechnology noting that, “planting [of genetically modified crops] in Europe has been much slower, but is accelerating as farmers start realizing the benefits of biotech crops.”

“Biotechnology is being exploited at an accelerating rate by Europe’s competitors, but if allowed to flourish, it will contribute to the increased economic and environmental sustainability of European agriculture and to efforts to ensure world food stocks keep up with rising demand,” Adds the manifesto.

Perhaps, the most interesting observation one can make from this manifesto is its call on Europe to respect other countries’ freedoms to grow and trade in genetically modified commodities.

“New biotech products and crops continue to be approved, cultivated and commercialized at a higher speed and in greater numbers in other parts of the world such as North America, South America, Asia, and South Africa,” It observes, adding, “…the EU (European Union) does not permit any presence of biotech material, approved outside the EU, to be present in traded commodities entering the EU.”

I have repeatedly pointed out in this blog that Europe needs to put its act together on GMOs. Europe’s current anti-GMOs policies hurt farmers in developing countries more than it does its own. As the manifesto notes, the EU strictly prohibits agricultural imports containing minutest of GMOs. What this means is that most developing countries won’t dare touch GMOs for fear of losing lucrative European markets for their agricultural products. By default, the EU has barred them from growing genetically modified crops.

This is unfair, to say the least. The EU accords member countries flexibility to grow or not to grow genetically modified crops. They’re even free to trade their biotech agricultural products within the EU block unhindered. And the EU won’t object if they donate, as relief aid, some of their surplus biotech food to developing countries. In fact, the European Commission (EC), the EU’s executive organ, itself, hauls tones and tones of food, some of it biotech, to poor countries, “to feed the hungry and malnourished….”

…It’s every farmer’s solemn right, whether in Europe, Africa, Asia, or America, to experiment on new agricultural technologies such as biotechnology. Unfair laws, such as the ones being maintained by the EU, should never be allowed to stifle such endeavors.

Read full article at GMO Africa.

Earthtimes.org
March 8, 2007

Excerpt from press release by U.S. Grains Council …

Biotech crops have produced a decade of improvements in yield and net farm income for grain, oilseed and cotton farmers. Now, according to a peer-reviewed study on the crops’ global economic and environmental impact, the benefits are “clear” — especially reductions in carbon dioxide emissions.

In 2005, herbicide-tolerant biotech crops planted using conservation tillage practices helped to retain carbon in the soil. Insect-resistant crops dramatically reduced the need for spraying, while also significantly reducing farm fuel usage. All told, biotech crops, planted during their 10th year of use on 87 million hectares (215 million acres) by 8.5 million farmers, reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 9 billion kg. (8.9 million tons). That’s the equivalent to removing nearly 4 million family cars from the road for an entire year, according to study author Graham Brookes, director of PG Economics Limited of Dorchester, United Kingdom.

Biotech Crops and the Green Era

“Simply put, biotech crops have changed the way people farm,” Brookes said. “Their environmental performance during the first decade of use shows the important role the technology is playing both now and in the future in helping global agriculture reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.”

According to Brookes, countries such as the United States, Canada and Argentina have led the way toward these environmental benefits by utilizing herbicide-tolerant crops to switch to no- and low-till crop production. There and elsewhere, insect-resistant biotech crops also have reduced sprayings. It all adds up to less tillage and reduced field operations, he said.

Brookes’ study estimates that since their commercialization in 1996, biotech crops have saved farmers 1,679 million liters (441 million gallons) of fuel through reduced field operations — eliminating 4,613 million kg. of carbon dioxide emissions.

Disturbing the soil with conventional tillage releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. No- and low-tillage cropping systems that use biotech herbicide-tolerant varieties, Brookes said, leave more plant residue on the soil’s surface, sequestering the carbon and contributing to soil and water conservation.

In Argentina alone, the study estimates that herbicide-tolerant varieties helped to increase no-till soybean plantings by 157 percent, from 5.9 million hectares in 1996 to 15.2 million hectares in 2005 — reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 20,988 million kg.

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