To eat or not to eat — that is the question increasingly asked in China. The issue of genetically modified organisms, GM foods, is making headlines and the debate is fierce.After 20 years of commercial growing worldwide, a broad scientific consensus exists that GM food is safe, but debate has heated up in China and it’s getting emotional.
Several education campaigns have been launched by experts and organizations to persuade the public that GM food is safe to eat and has many benefits. These include hardiness, high yield, resistance to pests, disease, drought and herbicides, among others.
GM food tastings, including golden (vitamin A-enriched) rice dishes and education forums have been held around the country.
The Chinese government isn’t taking sides. It supports more education.
“We and related government departments will strengthen our work to let more people know what a genetically modified organism (GMO) is, understand it and eliminate their worries about the safety of GM food products,” Agriculture Ministry spokesman Bi Meijia said in a briefing on December 6, according to Reuters.
Two months ago, 61 members of Chinese Academy of Sciences submitted a joint letter to the political leadership, calling for the central government to support industrialization of GM crops.
Immediately, the scientists were widely condemned online as unpatriotic “traitors” who were bought off by foreign seed companies.
“If we can support ourselves with our own conventional rice, which has been proved safe and healthy during the past five thousand years, why do we hurry to industrialize GM rice?” said Professor Jiang Xiaoyuan, a PhD holder and dean of the school of the history and culture of science at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. “Those who are trying to promote GM rice in China must have their own hidden agendas.
“There may be no evidence now of harm to health or the environment, but no one knows what will happen in the future,” he told Shanghai Daily in a recent interview.
The pressing question is whether China should commercially develop its own GM staple crops to ensure its own food security and non-reliance upon foreign imports.
Rice is an emotive issue; no GM rice is imported or planted commercially, though safety certificates have been issued for two strains of domestically developed GM rice and a strain of GM maize. The reason: public opinion.
China’s GM imports include corn, soybeans, rapeseed for oil, sugar beets and cotton, all approved for safety.
The soybeans and corn are used for edible oil (which does not contain transgenic material) and for ingredients in animal feed (which does contain transgenic material).
Many strains of GM corn have been approved to satisfy the increasing demand for meat, which is grain-fed.
According to US Department of Agriculture figures, China’s corn imports totaled around 3 million metric tons in 2012-13 and are expected to reach around 7 million metric tons in 2013-14.
In China, only GM cotton and papaya are planted commercially; cotton is overwhelmingly GM.
The GMO debate is complex, emotional and taps into deeply rooted fears over food security and safety.
The Chinese public is already anxious about food scandals and farming techniques that use large amounts of chemical fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, hormones and antibiotics. There are also worries about contaminated soil.
Complex, emotional debate
Even among well-educated people, there’s unease about GM foods and unforeseen health consequences, though none has been identified. What’s seen as tinkering with nature is unsettling.
One strain of GM “golden rice” is even enriched with vitamin A for better nutrition in impoverished areas. Vitamin A deficiency can lead to blindness. Tastings have been held around the country. But that’s not enough to persuade the public of its benefits.
Anti-GM forces, mostly health and environment advocates including some scientists, have fanned rumors of cancer cases, low sperm count and altered human DNA — all disproved.
GM food has also become a nationalistic issue, with GM advocates called “traitors” for supposedly succumbing to big US biotech agribusiness and trying to make the Chinese nation dependent on imported GM crops. None of that is happening.
Aware of public sentiment, the Chinese government is unlikely to embrace greater production of GM crops and GM imports until it can build public support.
It is concerned about food security, however, saying this stands at around 95 percent and will remain at that level. China is interested in GM food that can withstand difficult environmental conditions at a time of global warming and produce good yields to feed more people on limited arable land.
A pro-GM seminar, “Gala of GM Food,” was held in Beijing early this month, attended by Chinese GM researchers and agricultural experts. Shanghai Daily and other media were invited. The event was organized by CCTV reporter and commentator Wang Zhi’an, who supports expanded gene technology and development of GM food.
The conference was criticized as being furtive and even “terrible.”
GM has been controversial worldwide since it was developed around 30 years ago. In 1994, the first transgenic crop for marketing, the Flavr Savr tomato, was approved by the US Food and Agriculture Department.
GMOs are organisms in which the genetic material has been altered in a way that does not occur in nature. It involves transferring selected individual genes from one organism into another, also between non-related species. These methods create GM plants, which are used to grow GM crops.
There is broad scientific consensus that food on the market derived from GM crops poses no greater risk to human health than conventional food.
According to the World Health Organization, GM foods on the international market have passed risk assessments and are not likely to present health risks. In addition, no effects on human health have been shown as a result of the consumption of GM foods by the general population in the countries where they have been approved, WHO says.
The UN agency also says that since GM foods are different, their safety should be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
