Need for more awareness of GMO risks

Science and progress are generally associated with the positive aspects of humanity while the natural and the untouched are somewhat seen as the primitive, sometimes barbaric side of the human life.

Yet, drawing a line between what is good for humanity and what is anti-progressive is far from reflecting the reality of the situation when one considers the practices some bodies practise and which they try to justify using this same argument.

One such case of the "progress" versus the "natural" debate are genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Laboratory-made organisms are produced for a variety of reasons, starting from changing the shape of such organisms to facilitating transportation (therefore decreasing costs), increasing resistance to pests and pesticides, facilitating the growth of such organisms and so on.

Some also claim that GMOs represent a giant leap aimed at improving organisms. This simplistic picture tends to give the impression that GMOs are beneficial to consumers or that it would somehow solve world hunger. However, this is not necessarily the case.

We humans have always tried to dominate and go beyond nature in order to assert superiority. Yet, we must be careful when we speak of GMOs since these can be detrimental to consumers, producers, especially farmers, and to the general distribution of wealth in the world.

The first problem with GMOs arises with the uncertainty of the effects on humans and our surrounding environment. It is still uncertain whether GMO food is detrimental or not to humans. However, as experience has taught us, it is very risky to introduce alien organisms in an already balanced environment.

One common example is the introduction of the cape sorrel in the Maltese environment which has dominated the flora and destroyed a number of other plants. GMOs pose an even greater risk, since modifying organisms genetically generally means making them stronger and more difficult to eradicate and, therefore, giving them an advantage over natural organisms which already form part of the current ecosystem.

Therefore, it appears that terms used by GMO producers, such as co-existence of GMO and non-GMO crops, can never happen since the introduction of alien organisms may easily mean the eradication of other organisms.

It is especially farmers who intend to keep on producing their crops in the traditional way who will be negatively effected, especially if GMOs end up penetrating their own fields. And this would mean the Maltese agricultural product will lose its main characteristic: quality and tradition. This would automatically imply a decrease in the demand for the Maltese product.

Yet, even if GMOs are proven harmless to humans, and not to provoke an imbalance in the natural ecosystem (hardly possibly), there still remains one fundamental problem: The dependence of farming on laboratory-made seeds and multinational dominance of the food industry.

Since GMOs, as the name implies, are genetically modified, they are immediately patented by the company which has modified such crops (it is not correct to say that the company has invented it, since it has merely modified parts of its DNA), and, therefore, such companies end up claiming ownership over nature.

This eventually means that, even if a farm is involuntarily infested by GMOs, for example, due to wind, insects or birds, the farmer will have to pay the company for his own produce. One cannot forget that, obviously, the company experimenting on organisms will not merely modify it to make the organism stronger but also to increase the dependency of farmers on the same companies.

This can be achieved by, for example, eliminating the natural reproductive skill of the crop and, therefore, forcing the farmer to buy the seeds of such crops from the company season after season, instead of letting the plant itself reproduce seeds naturally - free of costs and of any other harm.

It is therefore incorrect to assume that the GMOs issue is only an agricultural one since it represents an attempt to control the food industry in order to generate more and more profits for few multinationals. In a global economy where fewer and fewer companies are dominating the ever increasing markets, it is important to resist such dominance, and to organise ourselves to save what little sovereignty the food industry has.

The EU has until now played a vital role in opposing GMOs, yet it is apparent that the same EU is giving in to the US, and its giant multinationals, in order to lift a ban on GMOs. But we are still in time to prevent this catastrophe.

The Mediterranean Social Forum, which met in Venice on November 25 and 26 , at which Malta was also represented, has dealt with this problem and has proposed a number of initiatives.

First of all, the forum discussed the importance for people to know what the problems are when we talk about GMOs and the need for all, but especially farmers, to get informed and organise themselves to resist such a problem.

Secondly, it has recognised the need for local governments to take a clear "no" stand to GMOs and declare their local territories GMO-free.

Albania will be doing this and Austria is at odds with the EU over declaring its national territory GMO-free. Yet, if it is only Austria to risk such threats and actions by the EU over such a courageous stand, it has a high probability to lose this battle. That is why the Mediterranean Social Forum is urging all EU member states to declare their national territories GMO-free and put the EU in a situation where it has to keep abreast of the situation in the member states, and not vice versa. This act is not an act to merely disobey the EU but it is an attempt to change the EU for the better. This is something the forum always believed in and it is mirrored throughout the various activities it has organised.

It is therefore very important to create a broad alliance here in Malta involving farmers' unions, consumer rights groups, environmental NGOs, political parties and all others who believe in the sovereignty of the food industry, in order to promote this idea and to work on a European level and try to make the EU a better institution and, therefore, reclaiming back the citizens' will over multinationals' interests.

The author is PRO of Move! Organisation.