GM-free Scotland

January 1997, pro-Natural Food Scotland had a meeting with a member of the Advisory Committee for Novel Foods and Processes (ACNFP). After voicing a number of concerns about the safety of the imminent GM foods, we were assured that these foods had been intensively argued over by the Committee and that their safety assessment was rigorous. After this first introduction to the gospel of
‘rigorous’ assessment, the idea seemed to pop up every time fresh concerns about GM food were raised.

Six years later, the Food Standards Agency (which had subsumed the ACNFP) replied to a three-page letter detailing several potentially dangerous implications revealed by its own research on GM, with a single sentence: “We would like to re-iterate the point that all GM foods undergo a rigorous safety assessment prior to approval in accordance with EC rules and if there are any concerns that a product is unsafe then it would not be authorised.”

The GM safety ball has been passed over the years from a Government advisory committee to a new, dedicated food safety watchdog and then to Europe. But the record hasn’t been changed; in fact, it seems to have got stuck.

‘Rigorous’ means logically accurate and strictly enforced. There is no doubt that this has always been true of the assessments used for GM foods in the UK. The prototype assessment, the ACNFP’s 1994 “Structured approach to safety assessment of novel foods and processes”, describes a detailed and comprehensive strategy. However, closer inspection reveals ‘get out clauses’ which can be interpreted elastically to avoid any meaningful studies being imposed. For example, the second question in the Nutritional Assessment decision tree is “Is the novel food nutritionally equivalent to existing food items which it might replace in the diet?” Since “nutritionally equivalent” has no actual definition, and the ranges of nutritional parameters are very wide in all food derived directly from living organisms, this question will rarely lead to further investigation. For example, the hurdles set in the Toxicological Assessment decision tree are confined to:

• the existence of a comparator food (no problem for any GM food plant).
• the normality of its compositional parameters (no problem, these will always
  have very wide ranges in food derived directly from living organisms' .
• the toxicity of the novel ‘chemical entity’ (with no specification that the
  chemical entity has to come from the GMO actually being assessed).

In other words, ‘rigorous assessment’ does not mean that the GM food has actually been tested as food at all.

In July 2004, US attorney and GM food safety campaigner, Steve Druker, wrote to European Commissioner, Byrne, pointing out that EU advisory committees are making misleading claims when they assert that a GMO assessment has been “the most rigorous in the world” as this implies the food has passed every safety test available, administered to the highest standards.” It also implies that we
have actually developed the appropriate tests needed. None of these is true. The public was instructed in 1996 that the correct term for organisms which have had artificial DNA inserted was “genetically modified”, or GM for short. The term ‘modified’ was carefully chosen to play down the ominous presence of ‘engineered’ material in food, or, the threat of food which has been
‘transformed’ into something alien, or worse, of food which has been ‘transfected’ with little genetic bits that might be catching.

‘Modified’ means: “made less severe or decided; toned down; make partial changes in”. The message is clear: GM food has had minor genetic changes made in it, so minor that there is nothing to worry about. The terms which were elbowed out of the politically correct vocabulary deserve consideration.

Genetically ‘engineered’ is a perfectly accurate description. The added genetic material is constructed by man, even if the model for it was derived from a natural organism or even from the same organism as the one being re-designed. Many genes now used are entirely man-inspired. All artificial DNA has extra bits and pieces attached, such as a sequence discovered in viruses which makes the novel gene work overtime, and sequences discovered in bacteria which make the novel cells resist toxic chemicals so that they can be picked out from their non-novel brethren. Typical commercial DNA constructs, such as that in Aventis’ GM oilseed rape trialled the Scottish Farm Scale Evaluations, can consist of 29 different bits of foreign DNA copied from five different organisms belonging to two distinct kingdoms, plus six entirely synthetic pieces and “a large DNA duplication” never intended to be there.

Genetically ‘transformed’ is also very apt. The novel organisms have been changed: they have been changed to produce, at the very least, one novel protein. They are also changed in their metabolic balance and chemical pathway interaction, their overall gene expression (phenotype), their responses to stress, their genome stability, their reproduction, the activation of their immune-responses, their chemical composition, plus their environmental interactions, and their ability to support growth and to stimulate the immune-system of the consumer (you will find examples of all of these in other
articles in THE REAL ISSUE). In other words, genetically transformed plants are altered in every way relevant to food wholesomeness and sustainable agriculture.

Genetically “transfected” is a blunt description of the process by which novel organisms come into being. Each has been invaded by a piece of DNA which has been carefully constructed by man to penetrate the host genome, stick itself in place and dictate its will. Unfortunately, DNA constructs designed to ‘transfect’ may not stop where they first lodge, but could carry on ‘transfecting’, disrupting as they go.

Genetic ‘modification’ by-passes all the features key to the understanding of what has been done to our food: the presence of entirely man-made elements, the inevitable widespread alterations (both wanted and unwanted) in the final GM organism, and the infective and mobile nature of the added bit.

In 2003 we were given the privilege of a very short public debate over GM food and crops. But, genetic ‘modification’ had rigged the debate years before it even began.

But, ‘Rigorous’ and ‘modified’ are just words. The REAL ISSUE is not words, nor committee arguments, nor debate. The REAL ISSUE is that these words have been systematically applied for years to avoid answering questions on GM food safety and to mislead the public.

The REAL ISSUE is our lack of KNOWLEDGE.

Sources quoted:
Personal interview with Helen Miller, January 1997
Letters and information from Government, food industry and pro-GM lobby 1996 -
present (too numerous to list).
Letter to the FSA regarding its Reports FS G01007, GO 10008, GO 1010, GO 1011,
21.06.03 and their reply 21.07.03
Oxford English Dictionary
ACNFP Annual Report 1994
The Parliament Magazine 12.07.04 http://www.parliamentmag.com/
Aventis application to release GM oilseed rape, July 2000

REAL ISSUE articles:
The Dangers of Genetic Transformation,
Is GM food Safe?
Three Key Risks