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Topic outline

 

  • Time: 10 hours
    Level: Intermediate

 
 

Introduction

  • Introduction Resource
  • In recent years, scientists have made huge gains in their understanding of how genes can be altered and transferred from one organism to another – but that knowledge has been acquired amidst controversy...
 

Preamble

  • Preamble Resource
  • S250_1, Gene manipulation in plants focused predominantly on the science behind a number of transgenic crops, but also explored some of the social issues surrounding the development of Golden Rice. This...
 

1 Concerns about GM crops

  • Introduction Resource
  • There are at least three broad and overlapping areas of concern about GM crops. First, there is a concern that GM products might be detrimental to human health. These include concerns that:
  • 1.1 What is natural? Resource
  • Many critics of GM feel that the techniques reflect an unwelcome form of ‘tampering with nature’. This is a particular concern of some consumers with respect to food. Such a view is sometimes scornfully...
  • 1.2 A closer look at ethical issues Resource
  • Science can define what is practicable, what can be done, but it cannot determine which developments it is right to pursue; this is largely an ethical judgement. One sensible approach in making an ethical...
  • 1.3 Can GM crops feed the world? Resource
  • The issue of global food security is at the heart of many of the ethical issues related to GM technology. United Nations population scientists estimate that the world's population will increase by 2 billion...
 

2 A key point in the controversy over GM crops: the Pusztai affair

  • 2.1 Pusztai's experiments Resource
  • Issues of ‘fairness’ and our obligations to the developing world do not in themselves explain why the issue of GM plants attracts such controversy. This section focuses on an episode in the fraught history...
  • 2.2 Communicating Pusztai's findings Resource
  • In mid-1998, the Rowett Institute released a succession of press releases describing Pusztai's findings. The safety, or otherwise, of GM foods was a hot issue at the time and his preliminary findings gained...
  • 2.3 Drawing conclusions Resource
  • Sections 2.1 and 2.2 have summarised some of the major aspects of the Pusztai affair, but it should be said that almost every detail has been the subject of prolonged and heated dispute. Our purpose is...
 

3 Assessing the safety of GM food

  • Introduction Resource
  • Pusztai and his team were attempting to develop suitable tests to assess the safety of GM potatoes. Typically, testing the safety of GM food involves comparing its composition and/or its effects with that...
  • 3.1 Scientific risk analysis Resource
  • In the context of national and international legislation on the safety of food and animal feed, much of the thinking about assessing risk has come from the experience of developing legislation to cover...
  • 3.2 Assessing GM foods: substantial equivalence is introduced Resource
  • In the early 1990s, biotechnology companies were preparing to market the first food products derived from GM crops. This provided a challenge to legislators. There were no precedents to guide them as to...
  • 3.3 Incorporating substantial equivalence into national and international law Resource
  • The concept of substantial equivalence very quickly became important in international trade law. The WTO aims to harmonise national food standards to meet international norms. Under its rules, a country...
  • 3.4 A critique of substantial equivalence Resource
  • In the late 1990s, the principle of substantial equivalence came under sustained attack, and at this point it is worth examining both the points of criticism and the responses. In October 1999, Erik Millstone,...
  • 3.5 Responses to the critique Resource
  • A number of responses to the commentary were published in the letters pages ofNature, almost all of which objected to the article. For our purposes, a particularly interesting response came from Peter...
  • 3.6 Safety assessment today Resource
  • At the time of writing (2006), the descriptions of safety assessment for GM crops and derived products are far more rigorous than the vague prescriptions offered in the early 1990s (see Figure 2). This...
 

4 Public views and the GM Nation? debate

  • Introduction Resource
  • The first genetically modified organisms (GMOs) were created in the early 1970s, but for much of the 1980s biotechnology was a phenomenon confined to the laboratory. In 1988, ‘vegetarian cheese’, the first...
  • 4.1 The scientific and economic strands Resource
  • The review was undertaken by the GM Science Review Panel, chaired by the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir David King. Its role was to assess the evidence available in the peer-reviewed scientific...
  • 4.2 GM Nation? The public debate Resource
  • The key objective of the national dialogue on GM was to allow the exchange of views and information – members of the public would presumably learn more about the issues; experts and policy makers would...
  • 4.3 The outcomes of the public debate Resource
  • Box 2 contains an edited version of the Executive Summary of the document GM Nation? Findings of the Public Debate. This is a lengthy summary, but it is worth exploring in some detail. The unedited version...
 

5 Summary

  • 5 Summary Resource
  • There are two areas of general concern regarding the introduction of GM crops and food: the possible impacts on human health and on the environment. For some critics of GM technology, this reflects a feeling...
 

References and Acknowledgements

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