THREE years ago, a scientist in Scotland called Arpad Pusztai claimed that the genetically modified potatoes he had fed his rats made them ill. The resulting furore sent questions about the safety of GM food hurtling around the globe, confirmed Britain as a nation of GM sceptics, and added personal health fears to what might otherwise have seemed a list of distant environmental concerns.
Since then we have seen the world split into two camps. Some countries, many in Europe, have imposed bans on importing and growing GM crops. Others, notably the US, have grown, cooked and eaten them without knowing about it, or seeming to care that they don鈥檛 know. One way or another, 2003 promises to shake up this global divide and offer people on both sides of the GM debate a chance to rethink their positions. Will they take it?
One country to watch is India, home to a quarter of the world鈥檚 farmers. Last year the Indian government gave the go-ahead for growing GM cotton. In theory, the move will cut crop losses to the dreaded bollworm and liberate farmers from a dependency on hazardous pesticides. But will the GM varieties, developed for American soils, thrive in tougher Indian conditions? Will we see insect resistance emerge? And how will biotech corporations stop farmers using the seed without paying for it? The answers will be crucial.
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India is also worth watching because it is developing its own crops. Some of them, such as a potato variety with extra protein, are at an advanced stage (see 鈥溾�楶rotato鈥� to feed India鈥檚 poor鈥�). It is simplistic to see any new crop as an instant answer to hunger, but such projects at least offer India, and perhaps other developing countries, the chance to sidestep Western biotech corporations and set their own biotechnology agendas.
Europe, too, is trying to forge its own agenda. Though debate still rages on key points, the European Union is likely to introduce tough rules demanding that if or when GM food is grown or imported it must be labelled and traceable. The US is likely to respond with a trade war. Two weeks ago a US Department of Agriculture official called the proposed rules unworkable and irresponsible. 鈥淓uropean consumers are not sure about biotechnology, so hungry people in Africa don鈥檛 eat. It鈥檚 that simple,鈥� the official said.
The ugliest scrap this year is likely to be in Britain. Three years ago, ministers set up a series of farm trials to monitor the impact of GM crops on farmland biodiversity. With these nearly over, the government must decide whether to permit commercial growing. In the run up, ministers have commissioned new reports 鈥� one on science, a second on the costs and benefits of the technology 鈥� and set up a panel to organise what the government calls a 鈥渘ational debate鈥�.
Ministers, not unreasonably, want to avoid a rerun of lurid 鈥淔rankenfoods鈥� headlines. But their tactics are already backfiring. A row has broken out over the derisory sum of money set aside for the national debate, and the purpose of the debate and the status of the commissioned reports are confused.
Of course it would be wonderful if, this time round, the debate is calm and honest. Many opponents of GM crops see the key problem of the technology as the stranglehold over the food chain that it hands to the biotech industry. They should summon up the courage to say so, rather than scaremongering about antibiotic-resistance genes or appealing to vague notions of the technology being 鈥渦nnatural鈥�. Proponents of GM crops who want the technology to create more jobs for plant molecular biologists, or provide benefits for growers or the biotech industry, or let farmers use more benign herbicides, should also say so, rather than resort to claims that GM crops are the answer to world hunger and that it is 鈥渁nti-science鈥� to oppose them.
But is it going to happen? Pusztai鈥檚 rat tests, we now know, were irrevocably flawed. Yet their legacy lives on. India鈥檚 decision to grow GM cotton, for instance, was based partly on confidence that there will be no consumer revolt against its GM cotton or demands from Europe for regulations to label any T-shirts made from it. And the reason it can be confident? European consumers鈥� anxieties about GM have been skewed from the start towards largely bogus personal health risks, rather than the far more substantial social, economic and environmental issues. Europe has not yet had an honest debate about GM. Britain really ought to seize the chance.