I have sat on the fence about this subject for too long: genetically modified organisms aka GMOs. It is time to come clean. I declare that I cannot find any reason to brand GMOs a threat.
In fact, GMOs–Frankenfoods–hold solutions for feeding more people at less environmental impact.
Although I am no scientist I always try to base my opinions on scientific fact. Be it the need for a scientifically-managed hunt or how to understand climate change. Science has been my guide.
For years I resisted applying science about whether or not GMOs are safe. I wanted GMOs to be dangerous. It fit in with the cultural need for food to be "natural." I could not find any convincing evidence to support this. The result was confusion. Rather than write some clouded opinion based on anecdotal evidence and hearsay I kept my silence.
That is not an insignificant thing to do. Not for an environmental opinion maker. Food production is one of the greatest causes of global environmental distress. It affects everything.
My silence was intellectual cowardice. Keeping quiet on GMOs was a way of pacifying the community of environmentalists–my community–most of whom have fervent anti-GMO opinions. I guess I did not want to lose friends by holding an opinion contrary to group consensus.
Of course pacifiers are for babies; friends are rarely served by hearing what they want to hear and parroting the words of others is no basis for friendship.
The problem with forming an opinion about GMOs is that creating organisms in a laboratory setting feels so wrong, so unnatural. It goes against all the teachings about the benefits of "natural" foods. It goes against instinct. It must be a crime against nature.
Instinct is not always a good guide. Instinctively we feel that the earth is flat. It requires science to prove that it is round. People have been burnt at the stake for professing the round-world theory. Not unlike anti-GMO campaigners burning GMO crops today. Hungary famously burnt over 1,000 acres of GMO corn. I can't help but think of a parallel with burning books.
Social media feeds the public's fear of GMOs. Activists show pictures of rats with cancerous tumours and claim that GMOs are to blame. The origin of this is the now infamous French scientific study by Gilles Seralini that was retracted by the journal in which it was published. Its methodology was flawed. A strain of rats predisposed to tumours was used. It is junk science.
Another claim is that GMOs toxins make their way into maternal and fetal blood. A 2010 study shows this threat. The Bt protein Cry1Ab is introduced as a pesticide in some GMO crops and a study found it in pregnant women and their unborn babies. This is alarming until you realise that humans have no receptors for the protein. It has no effect on us. Different species react differently to chemical compounds. Do you know that chocolate is toxic to dogs? The worst chocolate will do to you is make you fat (but happy) but it can kill a dog. So, why is nobody burning cocoa trees?
There is a chasm between science and the pubic on GMOs. A recent PEW Research Center study found that 63 per cent of the American public considers GMO foods a health hazard. Among scientists the total opposite: an overwhelming 88 per cent found GMOs safe.
A team of Italian scientists reviewed 1,783 studies about the safety and environmental impact of GMOs. The conclusion was that no "significant hazards" have been found. Look it up online: "An overview of the last 10 years of genetically engineered crop safety research." (Alessandro Nicolia 2014)
GMO offers us an escape out of the conundrum how to feed 11 billion people on earth by the year 2100 without wrecking the planet. GMO plants can be designed to be more productive and require less water, fertilisers and toxic chemicals. They can be engineered to be more nutritious, combatting malnutrition. GMO technology can be used to reduce agriculture's greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation and soil erosion.
Using anti-science arguments to confuse the public about GMOs is wrong. It amounts to making up stories. It is ok to have differing opinions and to educate to the best of your knowledge and understanding. It is not ok to disregard science–not when you have a duty to inform about something so important to the future of the planet.
I apologise for having stayed silent. I call on all other environmental opinion makers to investigate GMO science and follow it honestly.