The recent adoption of the Federal law prohibiting cultivation and breeding in Russia genetically modified plants and animals, does not mean that the fate of GMOs in our country is solved forever. Competition in the global food market, in which Russia is actively involved, may force the government to reconsider its position on GMOs, especially since even relatively recently it was not so uncompromising as it is now. Throwing the government, which was going to permit the production in Russia of GM products, but the wave of anti-American sentiment has sharply changed his mind, show how politics and popular myths in this thread outweigh the rational arguments of science.
Chronicle of a death foretold
The full name of the “law on GMO” (FZ-358 dated July 3, 2016) is: “On amendments to some legislative acts of the Russian Federation and the RF Code on administrative offences in part of improvement of state regulation in area genno-engineering activity”. Article 2 this law prohibits the importation into the territory of Russia and use for sowing of genetically modified seeds as an amendment to the Federal law “On seed production. Article 4 in the form of amendments to the law “About the environment” introduces a ban on the cultivation and breeding of GM plants and animals. Exceptions in both cases are provided for carrying out examinations and research works. The sanctions for violation of the new amendments provided a very “vegetarian”: an administrative fine in the amount of 10-50 thousand rubles for officials and 100-500 thousand rubles for legal entities.
The “law on GMO” has put the final point in protracted discussions about whether the products concerned must be present on the Russian market and in what form. Although three years ago the “death sentence” GMOs were not obvious. The RF government resolution No. 839 of September 23, 2013 authorized the production in Russia of genetically modified food raw materials and food products from 1 July 2014, however it never came into force. Once in charge of agriculture, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich called GMOs “absolute taboo”, the fate thereof was virtually a foregone conclusion.
It is obvious that to a large extent on the verdict of GMOs was not only influenced by “horror stories” on this subject, appearing regularly in the media. Perception of GMO as an absolute evil contributed to the high politicization of the topic: it is believed that the promotion in Russia doing GMO insidious transnational corporations led by the American company “Monsanto”, the name of which long ago became a household word. From this point of view, the time for a final decision of the fate of GMOs in Russia was selected as a win — win – “Crimean spring” 2014. “Like Americans feed themselves with such products as products with genetic modification, let the fed, we do not need, we have enough space and capability to consume normal food,” — said Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. Therefore, the adoption of the “law on GMO” actually cemented political decisions two years ago and without any significant public debate.
The main argument of the opponents of GMOs are well-known: the use of GM technology poses serious risks to human health and ecosystems. “This can lead to genetic disaster in the scale of whole regions, — says Yuri Vasyukov, Deputy Director General of the holding company “EkoNiva” (one of the leading Russian producers of seeds). For example, genetically modified canola easily cross-breeds with its cruciferous relatives growing nearby, and in a few years around can grow the cress is the worst weed that does not take”.
At the same time, opponents of GMOs believe that conventionally traditional agricultural technologies allow to obtain the same yield and not the worst, and even better quality than transgenic methods. However, their development depends on long-term financing, and it all depends on the position of the state. “In agriculture, in General, not only in seed, not yet exhausted the potential of traditional technologies — continues to Yuri Vasyukov. — In Russia, there are breeding centres, and staff — not so bad. But these are complex issues that are not resolved in a year, we need large investments in breeding, and it gives results in five, seven, ten, twelve years. So private business will not invest in this sector without government assistance”.
The validity of this statement one could feel even in the winter of 2014-2015, when after a sharp fall of the ruble immediately skyrocketed prices of basic foodstuffs. Especially actively growing sugar prices — officials in the regions have even held a camera raids on stores with the aim of identifying malicious speculators, but the true causes of the rise in price of sugar man in the street was reported. Meanwhile, in the report of the Institute for agricultural market studies (IKAR) said that the key issue of the 2014/15 season — the timely provision of farms and agricultural holdings seeds effective hybrids of sugar beet (as well as fertilizers, plant protection, fuel, etc.). in the required quantity. Given the high imported component in the production of sugar (including seed), to blame for the rise in prices had clearly not among traders. This story has no direct relationship to the subject of GMOs, but it clearly shows how the real situation in the field of import substitution in the food industry is far from bureaucratic reports.
Science vs Frankenstein
General Director of Ikar Dmitry Rylko agrees with the opinion that the potential of traditional selection has not been exhausted, but in the long term it is not comparable because it allows you to do genetic engineering: “the subject of GMOs in highly politicized, but as they say, scientific-technical progress does not stop. In addition, you can come to the fore economic factors: if gradually able to change the opinion of consumers in a number of countries, the cultivation of crops traditional breeding and conventional products may gradually become uncompetitive workers may be lost to the user. In the short and medium term, the permission for the production of GMO products does not threaten us, but in the long run, I think it’s inevitable.
According to Dmitry Rylko, in favor of GMOs can lead to many rational arguments, and Russia already has agricultural holdings, not only with transnational capital that can openly advocate for farming in Russia GMO’s and justify their position. For example, sugar-beet growers are supporters of GMOs argue that the sugar produced from conventional and genetically modified beet, chemically indistinguishable, the chemical formula is the same; the same arguments lead producers of vegetable oils.
In addition, the number of potential supporters of GMOs are livestock and poultry holdings, especially those that are focused on export of its products. So she was in demand on the world market, they must first have a competitive production cost, a significant proportion of which goes to feed. It is clear that in this situation the advantage is, by definition, is given to those companies that use feeds from GM crops with higher yields. For example, not so long ago, Agricultural Biotechnology Industry from South Africa reported that the transition to the GM technology allowed to increase the yield of corn in this country, even in dry years, about 4.5 times, from 8.5 kilograms per hectare in 1991/92 the years to the current 37.2 quintal per hectare.
A significant part in camp of supporters of GMOs are academics, insisting on the fact that the popular “GM horror stories” are nothing more than myths. “The problem is that people don’t really understand what GMOs are. Someone thinks it has some preservatives, somebody thinks it’s a pesticide, someone had heard about some genes of Scorpions. Common sense here is clearly not working, ” says biologist Alexander Panchin, author of “Amount of biotechnology” caught in the last long list of award “Educator”. But take any report of any serious scientific or medical organizations (national Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, world health organization, the European Commission, the British Royal society): everywhere there is a consensus GMOs do not carry additional risks compared to their counterparts. Genetic engineering is simply a more precise method of changing the DNA of organisms than the classic selection”.
If you talk about the studies that supposedly confirm the danger of GMOs, the big resonance was caused by two experiences — Irina Ermakova and Eric Seralini. Irina Ermakova, Institute of higher nervous activity and neurophysiology Russian Academy of Sciences, investigated GM soybeans resistant to herbicides, and found that mortality using this product rats increased, they lagged behind in growth and poorly developed. However, this work was soon refuted, unable to withstand scientific criticism — opponents Ermakova emphasized the fact that soy itself, if it is used in pure form, contains a hormone-like substance and is bad for the body. French biologist Eric Seralini in his article in the scientific journal Food and Chemical Toxicology claimed that GM corn affects the formation of tumors, but his experiment does not stand criticism, for the reason that the scientist took the line of rats specially developed for the study of cancer. Even those rats in the control group, 80% die from cancer. Article Seralini was withdrawn from the journal.
All this, however, does not mean that GM technology is an urgent need to incorporate the “green light” — the arguments against GMO in any case can not be denied. “With the use of GMO crops there is a huge variety of serious issues — each time individually determined by food safety or that of GM varieties,” says Dmitry Rylko. Plus the issues of cross-pollination, “addiction” pests and weeds, biodiversity and others. But all this development, and they are solved in the framework of scientific debate, the mechanisms of enforcement, not of arguments such as “all GMO Frankenstein foods””.
The problem of the child and the dirty water
Another argument in favor of GMOs from the field of common sense — a significant number of countries in which the cultivation of GM crops has long allowed. The list includes such leaders of the global agricultural market, such as USA, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Brazil, Argentina, China — all on an industrial basis, GM has put about 30 States. The main part of plant GMOs are soybeans (globally transgenic by 29%, while in the United States and Brazil — more than 91%), cotton, corn, canola. As one example of the economic effect from the production of GM crops can result in the fact that in India for 10 years, the use of crops containing the Bt-toxin (it protects against pests) from the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, managed to save about $ 10 billion.
But on the other hand, we can think of many countries where GMO if not completely forbidden, it is under considerable suspicion. In the European Union, for example, the question of GMOs is also sufficiently politicized is one of the main points of the negotiations with the US on a Transatlantic trade and investment partnership (TTIP). One of the most important conditions from the EU is the preservation of mandatory labeling of GM products. In the EU, I am afraid that after joining the TTIP GM products from the USA, where labelling and even mandatory testing of products on health risk, there will be free fall in Europe. In addition, under the agreement on the Transatlantic partnership has a point about the “convergence of standards”, which causes the Europeans have fears that GM standards will converge in the American side and the European efforts to regulate or would be absolutely futile. So now, in Europe there is a trend towards increasing mistrust of GMOs — for example, last year the country and the individual regions of the EU have the right to prohibit the cultivation of genetically modified crops. However, in relation to GM products, Europe is divided: most GMO-friendly countries include Spain and Portugal, and the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Romania, and in Germany, on the contrary, since 2008, the share of GM crops has reduced to very little.
“Formally, in Germany there is no General ban on GMO products, but, as they say in Russian business, very bad PR,” says the graduate student of the Berlin Museum of natural history Victor Hartung. — The average man on the German street — as in Russia — I think that GMO is terrible, and the agricultural industry, focusing on most of the middle man, reduces the acreage of GM crops almost every year, so Germany is not cultivated for almost nothing. That is, as such prohibition is not no technology, but the individual grade — in a bizarre coincidence, exactly those that the EU as a whole allowed the ban in Germany there. But if a variety will allow, will begin various protests, can some people come and trample the crops (this has already happened), not to mention the reputational costs. And certainly no hurry to open theme restaurants such as “All GMO””.
According to Viktor Hartung, the issue of GMOs, we must distinguish at least two fundamental aspects — scientific and economic. From the point of view of scientific progress, genetic modification is a wonderful tool: traditional breeding spent years to randomly get something roughly similar to what you want, and using genetic modeling to obtain the desired properties of the body much easier and faster. For example, a new technology for editing genomes of higher organisms, CRISPR/Cas9 allows you to fix incorrect sequence of genes and thereby treating hereditary human diseases — it is not excluded that in the near future, its inventors received the Nobel prize in physiology and medicine. “Of course, you have to be careful, is very powerful. But such caution is needed with any technique, especially with new,” adds Hartung.
However, the main question is how all these innovations are used in specific activities of corporations. About how profitable this business is evidenced by financial indicators alone, Monsanto — for the last ten years, its revenue has more than doubled ($ of 7.34 billion in 2006, $ 15 billion in 2015), and net income increased from $ 689 million to $ 2.31 bn In the largest American Fortune 500 company world leader of GM technology now occupies 189 place.
“A lot of plants, just modified so they can withstand huge doses of pesticides, which often produces by the same company, and the plants themselves. It’s cheap and easy, but environmentally unfriendly — unlike, for example, from a technician, where the plant implanted a gene that will kill only insects, and only those, who will decide this plant to eat. Further, there are ways how to make plants were sterile, and thereby force farmers to buy seeds every year, or patents on genes and modifications, — lists Viktor Hartung. Are real negative economic aspects of GMOs, they have to do something, but not throwing the baby from the bath with the dirty water”.
