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The genetic modification of plants raises important issues
for science and the public, and the Royal Society encourages
debate, informed by sound science, about the potential benefits
and risks of this technology. We have been offering policy-makers
advice on GM plants during the development of this branch
of science and we have published a number of reports during
the last five years. Further details and the latest information
of the Society's work can be found at www.royalsoc.ac.uk/gmplants/.
The use of genetically modified (GM) plants has the potential
to offer benefits in agricultural practice, food quality,
nutrition and health. In the Royal Society's report 'Genetically
modified plants for food use and human health - an update',
published in February 2002, we found that there was no reason
to doubt the safety of foods made from GM ingredients that
were available then, nor to believe that genetic modification
makes foods inherently less safe than their conventional counterparts.
More specifically in this report we considered the possible
effects of GM food on human nutrition; the possible allergic
responses to GM foods; the potential effects on human health
resulting from the use of viral DNA in plants; and the fate
of GM plant DNA in the digestive system. Having reviewed the
scientific evidence we concluded:-
- that although one potential application of GM technology
is to improve the nutritional quality of crops, it is possible
that GM technology could lead to unpredicted harmful changes
in the nutritional status of foods. However such alterations
might also occur in the course of conventional breeding.
- there is at present no evidence that GM foods cause allergic
reactions. The allergenic risks posed by GM plants are in
principle no greater than those posed by conventionally
derived crops or by plants introduced from other areas of
the world.
- that the risks to human health associated with the use
of specific viral DNA sequences (e.g. the promoter derived
from the cauliflower mosaic plant virus) in GM plants are
negligible.
- that the very long history of DNA consumption from a wide
variety of sources poses no significant risk to human health,
and that additional ingestion of GM DNA has no effect.
In addition, the Science Review Panel has highlighted a number
of key issues for contributors to respond to, including
'New techniques for detecting very fine differences between
transgenic and the parental or recipient plants are becoming
available (e.g. proteomics). These could be very valuable
in detecting unintentional harmful interactions. However,
it does pose the question how would such data be used in a
safety assessment?'
We considered this issue in our 2002 study and found that
in the future, safety assessments might make use of new profiling
techniques such as micro-array technology for detailed studies
of mRNA expression, quantitative two-dimensional gel electrophoresis
and mass spectrometry for protein analysis, and metabolomic
analyses to look at changes in all metabolites and metabolic
intermediates. Application of such techniques to characterize
differences between the GM crop and the appropriate comparator
should help provide a rigorous scientific basis for hazard
identification. However, much development work remains to
be done, in particular to determine the utility of this approach
in relation to the wide natural variation in composition between
crops grown in different environments. Long-term research
is required before these techniques can be applied to safety
assessments of GM and non-GM foods. Therefore we recommended
that research should be undertaken to develop such technology
and to define the 'normal' compositions of conventional plants.
We welcomed the funding initiatives already put in place by
the European Union Framework V programme and the UK's Food
Standards Agency (FSA). We also recommended that the biotechnology
industry should collaborate with academia and regulators to
develop techniques and share reference data. This will help
ensure that the new techniques are wisely applied and that
agreement is reached on interpretation of results.
Professor Patrick Bateson FRS
Biological Secretary and Vice-President of the Royal Society
Reference : Genetically modified plants for food use
and human health - an update, The Royal Society, February
2002
www.royalsoc.ac.uk/templates/statements/StatementDetails.cfm?statementid=165
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