Risks of GMO

The risks of genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, could be substantial and irreversible. Concerns about GMO safey have been raised from a variety of sectors: religious, environment, public interest, scientific and government. While GMO technology provides major benefits, the potential for serious risks to the environment, human health and economic concerns still remains.

Environment: Cross-Pollination

The potentially negative environmental impacts of GMOs are numerous, and many are as yet unknown and could be irreversible. These include the loss of flora and fauna biodiversity, unintended harm to other organisms and reduced effectiveness of pesticides. According to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, one of the biggest concerns is the creation of "super weeds": the unintentional transfer of herbicide resistance genes from desired crops to weeds. Some of these concerns, however, are the same concerns that could occur with breeding.

Environment: Genetic Consequences

The artificial insertion of genes into organisms could destabilize that organism, encouraging genetic mutations that could be detrimental either to the environment, to humans or both. Insertion of the desired gene into a crop's genome could activate or deactivate other genes, causing unintentional consequences as well. For example, genes that orchestrate the precise development of tomatoes could be de-activated, leaving tomatoes rotting on the vine before maturation. Long-lived organisms, such as trees, would be most at risk with consequences unknown for perhaps years. It's entirely possible they would no longer bear fruit, or they would have weak trunks. Characteristics of bark we may rely upon for paper products may disappear. The possibilities are essentially endless. Furthermore, changes in gene expression of genes that already exist in the organism may have negative consequences by interacting with the product of the inserted gene. For example, the gene coding for the red color of berries could interact with the inserted disease resistance gene creating an entirely new protein that perhaps would cause cancer after the berries were eaten by humans. As of 2010, many of the consequences are purely speculative and true issues would not be known for perhaps years.

Environment: Animals

GMOs pose a potential risk to insects, particularly those involved in pollination of GMO crops, as well as birds, insects, organisms in soils, and water. The impact of GMO pollen in bees' gut or ingestion by bacteria is not known. One fear is that the insects may develop resistance to the pesticides after ingesting GMO pollen, creating swarms of pesticide-resistant bugs.

Intellectual Property

The risk of GMOs to the world economy may be significant. It is entirely possible that world food production would be dominated by a few companies, increasing the dependence of developing countries on industrialized nations. Foreign exploitation of natural resources, labeling issues and scientific advances skewed to interests of richer countries are just a few of the concerns.

Although eventually more efficient and economical, initial research and development costs involved in bringing GMO products to market are substantial. To offset these costs, companies patent their products. Infringement issues are a major issue. Monsanto, an agricultural company already involved in GMO technology, has sued farmers for growing crops that farmers claim to have inadvertently grown due to cross-pollination.

The University of California at Santa Cruz reports that financial investments in GMOs are huge; $200 million was invested in creating Flavr Savr, the first genetically grown tomato, and none of that investment was recouped. Recalls due to transgenic issues have cost the United States approximately $12 billion.(reference 4). In India, the genetically engineered cotton crops from Monsanto were a dismal failure, creating an economic and living crises for Indian farmers. New pests and diseases emerged and the cotton itself failed to prevent bollworm attack, the specific pest it was designed to combat (reference 5).

Human Health

Human health is also at stake. GMO plants may create new allergens or unintentionally confer antibiotic resistance in humans. As part of the technique, genes that confer antibiotic resistance are inserted into GMOs as "markers" but they could confer resistance to these antibiotics when consumed by humans.

Furthermore, due to lack of testing and long-term studies, the consequences on the digestive tract of animals, including people, who eat GMO products are unknown. According ProQuest, a 1999 article published in Lancet examined the effects of GMO potatoes on the digestive tract in rats and found appreciable differences in the intestines of rats fed GMO potatoes and rats fed unmodified potatoes. However, the gene introduced into the potatoes was already known to be toxic to mammals. Researchers simply chose the gene to test the technique and it was never intended for human or animal consumption.

As pollen spreads, pharmaceuticals derived from plants and fed to animals are then consumed by humans, also with unknown consequences.