The great genetic scandal

Some years back, Oman made an unusual request to India. The oil-rich West Asian country was interested in acquiring four pure-bred animals of the Tharparkar cattle breed found only in the dry, arid regions of Rajasthan. The Tharparkar species derives its name from a unique genetic endowment that enables the animal to traverse the massive Thar desert in western India, an ability which provoked the interest of the sun-soaked Gulf state. However, the frantic search to procure four genetically pure Tharparkar males failed. Only then did Indian authorities realise that the indiscriminate cross-breeding of domestic cattle with exotic Jersey and Holstein Friesian breeds under the Intensive Cattle Breeding Programme and the well-known Operation Flood had rendered more than 80 percent of Indian cattle a place in the nondescript category. In a country home to the largest population of cattle in the world – and some 26 recognised breeds of cattle – genetic contamination has taken its toll. More than a dozen Indian cattle breeds have by now disappeared, eroding the country's unique genetic diversity and cattle wealth.

There can be no remedy for the genetic pollution of cattle, since unlike vehicular pollution from diesel-exhausts, genetic pollutants have the ability to multiply. Unlike the automobiles which have jammed New Delhi's streets, the nondescript cattle which also throng city roads have the ability to reproduce and pass on their genetic contamination from generation to generation. The Supreme Court of India can crack down on erring vehicles and force the government to bring in less polluting fuel but it has no means to check genetic pollution.

The genetic pollution of cattle, however, has evoked no protest – nor have any lessons been learnt. The scientific and administrative machinery responsible for safeguarding the genetic purity of India's massive plant and animal genetic resources, which are so vital for future generations as well as for economic growth, has simply turned a blind eye to the way genetic contamination is being justified. The same scientific community which has all along told us that genetic diversity is humanity's insurance against future threats from disease, pests, climate change and biotechnology mishaps, remains silent when it comes to deliberate genetic contamination by the sunrise genetic engineering industry.

Unnatural problems

Soon after India approved commercial cultivation of Bt cotton in March 2002, a factory that used to purchase organic cotton from Maharashtra and convert it into knitting yarn and garments for exports to Japan was faced with a peculiar problem of genetic contamination. It could no longer locate 'straight variety' seeds from the Vidharba cotton growing belt. 'Straight variety', which is an indication of the stability of the genetic character of the plant, is an essential requirement for certified organic cotton production. DNA tests have shown that cotton varieties, including high-yielding ones, are contaminated by hybrids which destabilise their genetic make-up. With Bt cotton now introduced, the resulting genetic contamination can only grow worse. Despite this unfolding crisis, the Indian ministry of agriculture as well as the Cotton Corporation of India have preferred to remain silent and inactive. In fact, the Indian council of agricultural research, the umbrella organisation that oversees the country's agricultural research, refuses even to acknowledge that genetic contamination is a serious problem.

However, it is a serious problem, and one which has been well documented internationally. In Canada, for instance, genetically modified canola has spread widely, finding its way into conventional seed through pollen or accidental seed mixing. Rene Van Acker, a plant scientist at the University of Manitoba, admits that the country faces a serious problem. She says, "I think it's very significant and I also think it's a formal recognition that genetic pollution does happen". For farmers it means adding a second herbicide to their regular spraying to kill plants that have been genetically modified to resist their regular herbicide. For organic growers it is a devastating issue; any contamination of seed stock with genetically engineered crops destroys organic production. Traces of alien genes have also been identified in three cereal crops, two maize and one of soya, in the Navarre region of the Basque country, Spain. Analysis by two independent laboratories revealed that the polluting agent in one of the maize crops was Bt 176 maize, better known as the Compa CB variety of genetically modified maize, commercialised by the Swiss company Novartis, currently known as Syngenta following its merger with Astra-Zeneca of the UK.

More recently, the biotechnology industry orchestrated a mischievous campaign to discredit research by Ignacio Chapela and David Quist of the University of California, Berkeley, which established the spread of transgenes in maize crops. So powerful was the deafening chorus in opposition to this research by the key protagonists of the biotechnology industry that even the prestigious scientific journal Nature was forced to succumb to pressure. Such genetic contamination could ultimately destroy the world's available genetic purity, especially in hotspots of diversity. Despite Nature disowning the research paper, the National Biodiversity Commission of Mexico accepted the findings. Soon thereafter, the discovery of transgenic DNA by two separate teams in around 10 percent of crop plants sampled in Oaxaca province, which they described as "the world's worst case of GM contamination", only added weight to the Berkeley researchers' argument. The source of the contamination appears to have been transgenic Bt maize imported for food consumption from the neighbouring US, which apparently was cultivated and therefore spread by cross-pollination.

Nature was not the only one to stumble; the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) in Mexico, one of the 16 international agricultural research centres being run by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), was the next to exhibit a similar lapse in judgement. Asserting that such contamination would not spell doom, the CIMMYT oddly claimed that diversity could actually increase as a result "if plant scientists find a desirable trait in a contaminated variety, they can easily breed plants that contain the desired trait but lack the Bt gene". CIMMYT's defence of the genetic contamination unleashed by the private seed industry in the heartland of the Mexican maize gene pool is a clear indication of the alarming breakdown in scientific discourse. In fact, CIMMYT's assertion is in complete variance with the principles of conservation and utilisation of plant genetic resources. The official position of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), for instance, holds that "genetic diversity per se is valuable in that it evens out yield variability, provides insurance against future changes and is a 'treasure chest' of as yet unknown resources". The FAO also accepts that plant genetic resources are seriously threatened with erosion, "the consequences of which will be serious, irreversible and global".

And it is primarily for this reason that the CGIAR centres are engaged in collection, storage and conservation of plant genetic resources in genebanks. World food security depends in general on the 30 crop species that provide most of humanity's dietary energy and protein and in particular on the three crops – wheat, rice and maize – that together provide more than half. Other major crops, such as cassava, sorghum and millet, are also essential for food security, particularly for resource-poor people. Genetic diversity within all these species is important for their continued stable production.

Protecting purity

If genetic diversity can be made to 'actually increase' as a result of genetic contamination – the argument that CIMMYT forwards – and thereby 'make the overall mix that little bit richer', it is time to overhaul and possibly disband the international effort by the FAO, the CGIAR and the multitude of plant genetic conservation centres to collect and store available plant variability. Contrary to what CIMMYT says, agricultural scientists have made a tremendous effort in the past two decades to make global ex situ collections of over 6 million plant accessions. This all began when the FAO recognised the threat posed by genetic erosion and set up the Panel of Experts on Plant Exploration in 1963. The number of storage facilities has increased dramatically over the past two decades. Before the Second World War, the earliest plant germplasm collections were started by the legendary scientist NI Vavilov in the former Soviet Union. By 1970, there were about 54 seed stores, of which 24 had long-term storage capacities. Today, there are over 1300 national and regional germplasm collection centres operating in countries around the globe. India, for instance, has one of the largest plant collection programmes, and collections are stored in 70 different locations. Hundreds of millions of dollars are being raised every year to maintain the viability of these collections, as any disruption would be disastrous.

Given the importance of wild and semi-wild food plants to the livelihoods of many poor communities, an additional effort is also being made to conserve these species in protected areas. In Mexico, genetically unique wild populations of perennial maize are being specially conserved in a small portion of the Sierra de Manantlan Biosphere Reserve. The importance of this collection can be gauged from the fact that in Mexico only 20 percent of the local varieties of maize known in the 1930s is now cultivated because of replacement by more profitable crops. How much damage the Bt maize contamination has inflicted on the limited genetic diversity that exists is something that should be a cause for worry.

For some strange reason, the CGIAR has refrained from commenting on CIMMYT's unscientific claim that such contamination actually adds to the available genetic diversity. If CIMMYT, which houses the world's largest collection of wheat and maize germplasm, remains unperturbed at the pace and speed at which genetic contamination is growing, is it not time to take a fresh look at the policy of conserving plant germplasm? After all, if genetic pollution 'actually increases' available diversity, much more biodiversity can be added to the world's declining genetic wealth by encouraging genetic pollution. Why use taxpayers' money to maintain plant genetic collections globally when more efficient results can be achieved by allowing for indiscriminate genetic contamination?

To say that genetic contamination is nothing to be worried about is to ignore the reality that old varieties and wild relatives of crop plants are valuable resources for researchers and farmers, and are disappearing fast. Genetic erosion coupled with genetic pollution will destroy that unique genetic base and thereby create an unforeseen crisis on the food front.

The biotechnology industry, however, is not even remotely concerned. "It is better to acknowledge that a minimum of cross-pollination cannot be avoided, and not to panic", Guy Poppy of the British Biotech Association told the British science magazine New Scientist. Amidst the growing incidences of genetic pollution worldwide, the 'shouting brigade' of the biotechnology industry – comprised of distinguished scientists and their political masters – has already browbeaten governments to accept genetic pollution as inevitable. Governments have been made to believe that the likelihood of such 'inadvertent' genetic contamination in the future will grow along with the increasing number of GM crops being grown around the world. If one is puzzled as to why the industry, and its 'mouthpieces', remain immune to the crisis that is unfolding on the genetic pollution front, the answer is simple. The industry is in reality making serious efforts, whether legally or illegally, to contaminate cultivated species all over the world. From Canada to New Zealand, and from Greenland to Cape Horn, the industry is busy spreading genetic pollution. Aided and abetted by a 'distinguished' class of agricultural scientists, and backed by financially-starved governments, the industry goes on merrily destroying crop diversity. And once genetic contamination reaches a 'significant' level, the world will be left with no other choice but to accept the sad reality. Genetically engineered crops will then be pushed with impunity. The great genetic scandal is only beginning to unfold.