Wing and a Prayer: The Elusive Control Dream of Genetically Modified Foods

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Wing and a Prayer: The Elusive Control Dream of Genetically Modified Foods

     Animals, including humans, strive to find the easiest path forward through life's forests and pastures. We often go to great lengths to make the trek forward of greater value and less risk to ourselves and others. So it is with genetically modified (GM) foods: Just as with great challenges in the past, we are embracing the difficult objective of producing more food for an exponentially populating world. In doing so, like our grandparents, we undauntedly move forward into the battle and frequently return "Comin' in on a Wing and a Prayer" (The Song Spinners, 2014).

     We are early in the battle, and our new GM food weapons are beginning to run foul like a jammed chamber. As Hakim (2016) reports, GM crops in the United States are not significantly increasing yield as compared to non-GMO European equivalents. In addition, contrary to claims proffered by corporate GM crop producers, insecticide and herbicide use have risen dramatically. Although genetically enhanced Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) plants continue to give us a glimmer of hope in regard to the lack of adverse effects on non-target life populations (Kamle et al., 2017; Naranjo, 2014), insects are beginning to build resistance to genetic toxins as in the case of Bt resistance gained by corn root worms (Naranjo, 2014).

     Probably the most predominent danger however is the conflict of interest inherent in a GM food producer that both creates herbicide tolerant (HT) plants and sells herbicides. This threat is twofold in that plants are now becoming resistant to herbicides as in the case of pigweed (Hakim, 2016), which defeats the intent of the genetic manipulation, and by promoting herbicide use we are poisoning life on this earth including egregious endocrine disruption in humans (Marino et al., 2021; Milesi et al., 2021). Multiple organ shutdown is a rather compelling reason for discontinuing synthetic herbicides and thus HT crops.

     In creating Bt modified organisms, we demonstrated reasonable critical thought regarding what might be used as a solution to an existing problem (Naranjo, 2014), i.e., the use of a natural agent like the Cry protein to target particular pests (Kamle et al., 2017). We need to do the same regarding herbicides. For instance, both walnut trees and buckwheat exude chemicals that inhibit the growth of other types of plants in their vicinity (Đorđević, 2022; Gfeller, 2018). The genes from these plants, or others like it, might be used in genetically modified crops to eradicate unwanted weeds using a naturally derived method. This is a far better solution than being caught up in the life-threatening, spiraling, herbicide/glyphosate trap that corporations who have an herbicide/genetically modified organism (GMO) conflict of interest have put us in.

     In a perfect world, individuals, companies, and corporations would be responsible and have the integrity to withstand external pressures. As we know all to well, this is not a perfect world and the pressures exerted on entities continues to compound daily. In addition, the laws constraining corporations are not the same as those applied to the individual, even though in the United States the corporation is considered an entity unto itself. The expansion of corporations across multiple countries and therefore multiple jurisdictional realms, affords corporations the luxury of sidestepping constraints by acting out restricted behaviors in countries that are lax on those accounts.

     This ease of corporate escape compounded with conflicts of interest as in herbicides/GMOs and intense profit pressure creates the perfect unregulated storm that holds the possibility of irreconcilable harm to humanity. To make matters worse, the rapidly continuing advent of GMOs in combination with the necessary depth of investigation needed by regulatory bodies for each GMO to discern public safety (Smyth& Phillips,2014) makes the task of GMO regulation intractable. For humanity, the most probable course forward is that there is no going back, and with that it is paramount that we recruit the best, brightest, and most conscientious minds into the field of biotechnology.

References

Đorđević, T., Đurović-Pejčev, R., Stevanović, M., Sarić-Krsmanović, M., Radivojević, L., Šantrić, L., & Gajić-Umiljendić, J. (2022). Phytotoxicity and Allelopathic Potential of Juglans regia L. leaf extract. Frontiers in Plant Science, 13, 986740. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2022.986740

Gfeller, A., Glauser, G., Etter, C., Signarbieux, C., & Wirth, J. (2018). Fagopyrum esculentum Alters Its Root Exudation after Amaranthus retroflexus Recognition and Suppresses Weed Growth. Frontiers in plant science, 9, 50. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2018.00050

Hakim, D. (2016, October 29). Doubts About the Promised Bounty of Genetically Modified Crops. New York Times. Retrieved on February 5, 2023 from https://nyti.ms/2dR9DRr

Kamle, M., Kumar, P., Patra, J. K., & Bajpai, V. K. (2017). Current Perspectives on Genetically Modified Crops and Detection Methods. 3 Biotech, 7(3), 219. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13205-017-0809-3

Marino, M., Mele, E., Viggiano, A., Nori, S. L., Meccariello, R., & Santoro, A. (2021). Pleiotropic Outcomes of Glyphosate Exposure: From Organ Damage to Effects on Inflammation, Cancer, Reproduction and Development. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 22(22), 12606. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms222212606

Milesi, M. M., Lorenz, V., Durando, M., Rossetti, M. F., & Varayoud, J. (2021). Glyphosate Herbicide: Reproductive Outcomes and Multigenerational Effects. Frontiers in Endocrinology, 12, 672532. https://doi.org/10.3389/fendo.2021.672532

Naranjo, S.E. (2014). Effects of GM Crops on Non-target Organisms. In: Ricroch, A., Chopra, S., Fleischer, S. (eds) Plant Biotechnology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-06892-3_11

Smyth, S. J., & Phillips, P. W. (2014). Risk, Regulation and Biotechnology: the Case of GM Crops. GM Crops & Food, 5(3), 170–177. https://doi.org/10.4161/21645698.2014.945880

The Song Spinners. (2014, November 5). The Song Spinners. Comin´ In On A Wing And A Prayer (Decca 18553, 1943). YouTube. Retrieved on February 5, 2023 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9nykpDjG9c

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