Sunday 23 September 2012

amber waves or marie, marie quite contrary

amber waves or field-studies France, the bread-basket of Europe, has elected to extend a moratorium on the single genetically-modified crop, a brand of corn (maize) patented by a US firm, to make it past the European agricultural gate-keepers and into limited markets and into the food supply, pending further studies.

To err on the side of caution, especially on a subject that could prove highly invasive and irreversible, is to be lauded—also considering that such a decision wrangles the engines of commerce that force such experimentation on the public. The studies, however well-intentioned, may be admitting a tragic and fatal flaw, which serves no one in the end if the GMO industry is allowed first refutation: though not the exclusive rationale (and the right of refusal and sovereignty should not be trumped by corporate pressure), France’s hesitation and demand for proof is based on research that showed laboratory rats fed a diet of only said genetically-modified corn had a very high incidence of cancer. The tests and trials were conducted with scientific rigour and no outside audit found fault with the methodologies. No lab rat would like to be the guinea pig in this case, but the particular breed, dynasty of rats used, for control purposes, were of a lineage specially husbanded for research. These poor things don’t develop cancer if one looks at them funny, but that’s just about how it is. One should not accuse French scientists of faulty investigations or grasping at straws to curtail something that is not publically digestible, but rather further acknowledged for wanting to exercise due care in the case of experimental evidence that can be spun to support either side. Transparency in research reveals faults in our baseline standards, and likewise calls into question the reassurance that the agribusiness industry tries to peddle on the public with studies that show no conclusive ill-effects from such crops. Perhaps under controlled laboratory conditions, it is easier to induce indications of danger or of safety, rather than field-testing. The honesty of admitting factors hard or impossible to regulate would be a more accurate reflection of the commitments we are undertaking in attempting to tweak Nature and acknowledgement that we are all in over our heads.