1 Dangers of GM?

From a purely scientific standpoint, it is obvious that GM crops (and GM organisms in general) can be safe. Indeed, the issue is not really about GM crops per se, but about the nature of the genetic modifications. One can readily envisage selective breeding of crops that would be predicted to have serious environmental impact or other deleterious properties, and conversely that one could generate genetically modified crops that are wholly beneficial and with absolutely negligible risk of adverse properties. I therefore think that it is essential that this point is clearly explained to the general public, whilst of course being aware that the risk assessment needs to take into account the open environment in which crops are grown (see below).

2 Risk Assessment

Following on from my first point, it should be possible to classify some GM crops as having no realistic danger linked to them, whilst providing increased level of estimated risk as safeguards against cross-contamination are lowered and/or the GM protein products are known to have potentially dangerous biological properties. I would think that it would be reasonable to classify GM crops under these various headings of: essentially safe, low risk, medium risk, and high risk; and it would surely be only the safest classification for which current trials ought to be conducted. However, I also have serious concerns about the way the field trials are perceived for the following reasons:

3 Field Trials

Despite there being obviously some risk associated with new GM crops (although for the safest level one might regard this as negligible), there is in my view a contradiction in the way they have been tested which has confused me (and surely the general public too). The field testing simply cannot avoid the serious risk of GM material contaminating non-GM plants; if the purpose of the testing is to confirm the safety (or otherwise) of GM crops, and their environmental impact on the area being tested, then the tests themselves clearly risk the introduction of plants that turn out to have undesirable properties. In other words, the very testing of GM crops in the field, for which there is a perceived risk, necessarily introduces them into an open environment, and if they were found to be unsafe then the consequences would already have entered the environment. I believe this to be such a glaring contradiction that it contributes to the public lack of confidence in GM crops and their evaluation.

If, on the other hand, the field trials were to confirm that GM modifications did lead to improved crops (and this was really the only question being asked), then it should have been made clear that this was the point of the field trials.

From my comments above you will see that I have no intrinsic scientific concern with the use of GM crops provided they are properly assessed for their potential risk. Like most biological procedures, it is the specific genetic changes that might be introduced that constitute the potential risk rather than the genetic modification in itself. However, I think it is appropriate for me to raise below my final concern, which relates to the social and socio-economic impact of GM crops. You might primarily wish for feedback to relate entirely to the science, but I think the scientific community has a moral responsibility to raise other concerns, particularly as the use of such crops is likely to be driven by those with commercial interests if the scientific community fails to raise all of the issues.

4 Social Impact

GM crops fall largely under two groups. The first are genetically modified crops that produce specific compounds of special value (e.g. pharmaceuticals or pharmaceutical precursors). These crops clearly have a significant risk associated with the compounds they would generate, and the risk assessment is therefore a major issue. The other group of GM crops are those for which the modification leads to increased yields, or products that are more attractive to consumers, or plants that are more resistant to the conditions in which they are grown. It has been argued that some of the greatest benefits of GM crops are to help those areas in the world where conditions for growing them is unfavourable - e.g. drought areas - but I would caution that there is little evidence that companies would choose to develop crops primarily to help these areas of the world (cf. pharmaceuticals, which are developed almost entirely for the western market). On the other hand, it seems more likely that GM crops will mainly be used to increase productivity, and there is ample evidence that we are already producing more crops than we can distribute and use. I therefore feel that you should include a consideration of the impact on communities in rural areas if small farmers (for example) are forced out of business by the development of ever more efficient crop production procedures. Even more fundamentally, I think that we ought to be addressing issues of food distribution and social impact as a much higher priority than simply increasing productivity.

I hope this has been a useful contribution from someone who is scientifically aware of most of the issues, but is neither an expert in the field, nor has direct vested interest in the outcome. I look forward with interest to reading your GM Science Review.

Background:

Professor P D Bailey, Head of Organic Chemistry, UMIST. My scientific background is as an organic chemist who has substantial involvement in biological chemistry, but no direct expertise on crop science or GM plants in general