Indigenous farmers in Haiti cultivate crops from seeds passed down from generation to generation. Biotech critics say widespread use of some genetically modified seeds will hurt farmers in developing countries.
Photos: Darcy Kiefel; © Courtesy Heifer International
Most shoppers in America go to the grocery store without ever considering that one day the shelves might be bare. But many people living in rural areas of developing countries rely primarily on their families and neighbors to cultivate the garden-grown grains and vegetables that sustain them. Most do not take their food sources for granted. They understand very clearly how vulnerable their crops are to the elements. And now a new generation of genetically modified (GM) seeds may put their ability to feed themselves at greater risk, according to some humanitarian and environmental organizations. The seeds also could impact farmers in the United States by limiting farmer-driven seed selection and plant breeding. Activists warn this could put the control of food production worldwide in the hands of just a few large corporations.
The seeds, engineered with technology protection systems and genetic-use restriction technologies (GURTS), are getting closer to commercialization, said Kathy Jo Wetter, research specialist for the Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration (ETC Group), a Canada-based conservation and human rights organization.
The sterile-seed technologies, dubbed Terminator and Traitor seeds by activists, could spread to unsuspecting farmers’ lands through unwanted pollination, she said. “Communities that lose control over their seeds, adapted over centuries to their needs, risk losing control of their farming systems and becoming dependent on outside sources for seeds,” Wetter said.
The Terminator gene produces sterile seeds in the second generation by causing the plant to manufacture a poison that kills the seeds late in the growing season. It was patented in 1998 by the Mississippi-based Delta and Pine Land Co. and the U. S. Department of Agriculture, one of the government agencies charged with overseeing the GM industry, said Harry Collins, vice president of technology transfer for Delta and Pine Land.
The Terminator technology has gained widespread attention from activists opposed to its use.
But another seed technology that also poses a threat is not as well known, according to activists. It’s called Traitor seed technology. Traitor seeds require farmers to purchase and apply a chemical catalyst that activates the plant’s genetic traits responsible for resistance to pesticides or herbicides. Critics charge that the process could be used to control the plants’ fertility.
The seeds were designed to protect the intellectual property of biotech companies and can be used as a “bio-safety tool,” said Lisa Dry, communications director for the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a Washington, D.C.-based trade organization.
Biotech companies insist that their patented genes and seeds will help feed the world by making agriculture more productive.
“Our view is that biotech is a tool to address world hunger,” Dry said. “Hunger is a very complex issue but biotech can be used to extend the shelf life of food so that it can be shipped to remote areas. It can make crops more resistant to disease and drought and it can increase agricultural production.”
But opponents warn that the patented genes could contaminate normal seed stocks.
“Imagine if indigenous farmers all over the world started unknowingly planting seeds contaminated with the Terminator or Traitor gene — their crop yields could fall and world hunger would increase,” said Ronnie Cummins, national director of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), an advocacy group based in Minnesota.
More than a billion people could be impacted by food shortages if poor farmers are not able to use their saved seeds. According to the international Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), poor farmers cultivate 15 to 20 percent of the world’s food. A recent FAO report estimated that farmers who save seeds feed at least 1.4 billion people in developing countries annually: 1 billion in China, 300 million in Africa and 100 million in Latin America.
The way a plant gene interacts with its environment cannot be completely controlled, according to many scientists. Every grain of pollen engineered with seed sterilization technology that gets picked up by the wind or an insect will carry with it the possibility of contaminating neighboring fields, said Rich Hayes, a spokesperson for the Union of Concerned Scientists, an independent nonprofit of more than 100,000 scientists and supporters.
Hayes said that technologies developed by the biotech industry will help to feed the world’s growing population but added that some biotech marketing campaigns may be exploiting humanitarian issues to help sell products.
“Most scientists agree that biotech could play a minor role in developing new agricultural products,” Hayes said, “but the companies are really using world hunger to get better press.”
The use of GM seeds continues to grow most rapidly among farmers in developing countries. According to the website of Monsanto, one of the world’s leading agricultural-biotech companies, 1.25 million more farmers planted GM crops in 2004 than the previous year. Farmers in developing countries accounted for 90 percent of the growth.
The ETC Group contends that the biotech industry is twisting the issues.
“There is already enough food to feed the world. The real problem is that people can’t afford to buy food,” Wetter said. “The biotech companies are looking for ways to enforce industry monopoly.”
While the debate over whether biotech companies will empower developing countries to end hunger continues, gene giants like Delta and Pine Land Co. and Monsanto are trying to “force Terminator and Traitor seeds on farmers in Canada,” Wetter said.
But Chris Horner, a spokesman for Monsanto, denied that.
Horner said the company is not working to commercialize any sterile-seed technology or technology that would cause a particular trait not to develop in the second generation.
Monsanto announced in 1999 it would halt all efforts to market Terminator seeds when the seeds fell under international scrutiny, Horner said. Monsanto also backed out of negotiations to purchase Delta and Pine Land, the company that owns the Terminator seed patent and marketing rights to the technology, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization.
Delta and Pine Land, a cotton breeder and research company, plans to commercialize the technology.
“We have never hidden the fact that we hope to continue to develop and market technology protection systems and GURTS,” Collins said. “Seed companies have to have a way to recoup their investments.”
The technology could also prevent the rare chance of genes escaping in to related wild plants through cross pollination, according to Collins. All seeds produced by an escaped gene would be sterile.
“In the end it is up to the farmer to find the best seeds,” Collins added. “It’s their choice.”
The ETC Group accused the company of “greenwashing.”
“The very companies whose GM seeds are causing unwanted contamination are now insisting the society accept another new and untested technology to contain genetic pollution,” Wetter said.
The Terminator seed technology debate heated up recently when the ETC Group leaked a document that said the Canadian government was planning to open Canadian soil to Terminator field tests during a meeting of the United Nations Convention on Biodiversity in Bangkok, Thailand. Farmers, scientists, governments and civil organizations flooded the Canadians with protest e-mails, Wetter said.
However, while Terminator seeds have been labeled by opponents as the “most morally offensive” gene technology there is, Traitor seeds may pose a more immediate threat, according to Cummins of the OCA.
The biotech companies could easily switch on and off plant fertility using Traitor technology, he said.
“The Terminator is never going to be popular and Monsanto knows that,” Cummins said. “Traitor seeds could also be used to render plants sterile and they are not on as many people’s radar.”
Erin Meyer is the associate editor of Conscious Choice magazine.