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HARM FROM "PHARM" CROPS?
From: RayelanPosted By: Phoenix
Date: Saturday, 25 May 2002, 8:39
p.m.
In Response To: MONSANTO'S SECRET GM WHEAT PLOTS DISCOVERED
(Spiritual_Piglet)
READY FOR DRUGS, VACCINES & GENES IN YOUR
CEREAL?
HARM FROM "PHARM" CROPS?
Have you heard
about "PHARM" crops?
"These crop plants have been engineered to
make novel compounds for medical and industrial purposes pharmaceuticals,
industrial enzymes, reagents for biochemical laboratories. About 20 companies
worldwide are developing plants for the production of pharmaceutical or
industrial proteins. Many of these crops are grown in open fields, and since
companies in the U.S. are not required to disclose the information about these
field tests,
the location of the trials are generally closely held
secrets."
http://www.greenpeace.org/~geneng/reports/food/pharmrice.pdf
Although, in theory, "Pharm"
crops are an efficient way to produce drugs and chemicals by growing in grain,
there are some very grave potential problems.
The main problem is
that the genetic changes to the crops will spread to nearby fields.
This is a fact.
Wind, birds, bees, etc; the pollen
will spread.
The other main problem is that some "Pharm" crops
are being developed for direct consumption by YOU AND ME!
By the
way, don't expect your government to be monitoring this process carefully.
Check it out for yourself at this USDA site:
http://www.usda.gov/agencies/biotech/index.html
Green Peace further states:
"None of the companies have a commercial permit for the
cultivation of these crops. In the case of avidin and beta-glucuronidase, the
companies are selling the chemical in commercial channels, but hiding their
actions behind a "research" permit provided by the USDA. With this type of
permit, the chemicals and field locations can be kept secret."
Q:
What kind of products are companies developing in gene altered plants?
"About 20 companies worldwide are developing plants for the
production of pharmaceutical or industrial proteins using rice, wheat, corn,
barley, tomatoes and other plants. Companies have already conducted open field
trials of plants that PRODUCE HEPATITIS B VACCINE, HUMAN ANTIBODIES AGAINST
HERPES AND OTHER DISEASES, AND HUMAN BLOOD PROTEINS."
http://a520.g.akamai.net/7/520/1533/18a7c761c1b779/www.greenpeace.org/%7Egeneng/reports/food/pharmQ&A.pdf
Far fetched, this idea of
drugs, vaccines and genes in our cereal?
OK then, let's take a
look at what Applied Phytologics, Inc. (API) is doing.
According
to their website they are developing EDIBLE HUMAN THERAPEUTIC PRODUCTS.
API is currently developing numerous products derived from
enhanced cereal grains.
"Edible Human Therapeutic Products
In the United States, annual retail food sales approximate 500
billion dollars. Consumers increasingly demand and pay a premium for food
products that confer health benefits beyond basic nutritive values of growth and
maintenance. API's edible human therapeutic products use enhanced grains as
vehicles for nutritionally improved foods processed through traditional systems.
Because grains are mankind's most important source of nutrition, product
opportunities with enhanced grains are broad.
Cereals are
generally recognized as safe by regulatory agencies and consumers
Cereals generally recognized as safe help lower regulatory barriers to new
biotechnology enhanced products and increasing consumer acceptance of
value-added foods."
http://www.apinc.com/KEYPRODUCTS.HTML
Some more comforting words from the PEW
Initiative on Food and Biotechnolgy:
"Scientists have found that
genetically modified plants can produce vaccines for human and animal illnesses
ranging from colon cancer to traveler's diarrhea to tooth decay. Technology
developers believe that using foods to deliver vaccines could have the benefit
of permitting the vaccine to be consumed directly by humans or animals as food
or feed, and eliminating the need for purification of the vaccine strain and the
hazards associated with injections. Some of the plants used to develop the
vaccines include corn, spinach, tobacco, lettuce, tomato, soybeans and potatoes.
Plants may also be used to produce medical compounds for use in humans, such as
monoclonal antibodies, hormones, or blood proteins."
http://pewagbiotech.org/research/harvest/
Then we have the
contraceptives:
"Scientists have created the ultimate GM crop:
contraceptive corn. Waiving fields of maize may one day save the world from
overpopulation.
The pregnancy prevention plants are the handiwork
of the San Diego biotechnology company Epicyte, where researchers have
discovered a rare class of human antibodies that attack sperm.
By
isolating the genes that regulate the manufacture of these antibodies, and by
putting them in corn plants, the company has created tiny horticultural
factories that make contraceptives.
"We have a hothouse filled
with corn plants that make anti-sperm antibodies," said Epicyte president Mitch
Hein.
"We have also created corn plants that make antibodies
against the herpes virus, so we should be able to make a plant-based jelly that
not only prevents pregnancy but also blocks the spread of sexual disease."
Contraceptive corn is based on research on the rare condition,
immune infertility, in which a woman makes antibodies that attack sperm."
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=63727&group=webcast
Then we have a myriad of other
bizarre combinations of genetic material that may show up in our environment or
food.
Weird food-gene combos defy imagination
By Anita
Manning, USA TODAY
"Biotechnology researchers, heading off into
uncharted worlds, may one day produce bacteria that detect land mines, fish that
sniff out pollutants, and spider silk made from goat's milk.
These
are among the dozens of products biotech companies are developing, says a report
out Thursday from the Pew Initiative on Food and Biotechnology.
"We
wanted to look down the road five or 10 years to see what this technology is
producing," says Mike Rodemeyer, executive director of the Pew Initiative. "It
is a very powerful technology, and the report provides a lot of interesting
examples of this. But at the same time, it's the power of this technology that
is raising safety and environmental issues."
Among the products
highlighted:
· Spider silk, one of the strongest natural
materials, can be used in bulletproof vests, but it's hard to grow commercially.
Researchers can now make it using a protein from goat's milk engineered with a
spider gene.
· Malaria-resistant mosquitoes and other insects
that can't carry human diseases are being investigated, along with methods to
control insect pests without using chemicals.
· Bacteria that are
genetically modified to be sensitive to TNT are being created for use in
detecting explosives, including land mines. The bacteria contain a gene from
jellyfish that creates a fluorescent glow, which changes color on contact with
TNT.
· Zebra fish are being engineered to act as biosensors for
pollutants such as dioxin or PCBs.
· Plants are being modified to
produce vaccines and other pharmaceuticals and to provide extra nutrients.
Rodemeyer says the Pew Initiative is neutral, but it wants to
spur public debate over the future of biotechnology.
One concern
is how the government will regulate new products to assure safety, he says. One
example is a new breed of "super-salmon," genetically modified to grow rapidly.
The question, he says, is what impact would these fish have on native salmon if
they were released into the wild? "We have a system put into place for products
that predated biotechnology," he says, "not products that have the potential of
replicating themselves in nature."
Matt Rand of the National
Environmental Trust echoes that. "We feel the U.S. government does not have the
proper regulations in place to govern over these foods," he says. "They are
entering the market and environment without the proper safety studies."
But Val Giddings of the Biotechnology Industry Association sees no
need for new regulations. "One of the great strengths of the regulatory system
is that it can be adapted to ensure that we can enjoy the benefits of these
products while keeping any risks under firm control."
As for the
threat of fast-growing salmon, Giddings says, that's a red herring:"
http://www.usatoday.com/advertising/orbitz/orbitz-window.htm
By the way, I wonder just how
"neutral" the PEW Initiative is?
Last Fall they had a very
ambitious series of conferences on Food and Biotechnology throughout the U.S.
http://pewagbiotech.org/calendar/
Interesting that Rockerfeller Foundation
has also been supporting (3 million) this topic.
www.netlink.de/gen/Zeitung/1999/991215e.htm
Why do I say these
products may show up in our cereal without our knowledge?
Because
at this time there are no regulations requiring U.S. companies to label food as
GE (genetic engineered) or GM (genetic modified).
AND
There are already "Pharm" fields in our midst.
Green Peace located one of API's secret fields last Fall.
"Frankendrugs" with Human Genes
Spliced into California Rice Fields
OUTDOORS 'PHARMING' OF DRUGS RISKS CONTAMINATION
London/Washington, 7th September, 2001 -
"Open field trials of
genetically
engineered (GE) rice containing human genes are being
carried out in the
heart of the California's traditional rice growing
region, according to
Greenpeace. The experiment is being carried out
to produce pharmaceuticals.
Activists from the international
environmental group marked out the field
with giant syringes to
highlight the risk of growing drug-producing GE
crops outdoors. No
special effort to protect the environment and the food
chain had been
made.
The nature of all of the compounds produced by these GE rice
plants in
Sutter County has been kept secret from the public but
Greenpeace has
identified two of the proteins produced in them as
human lactoferrin and
human lysozyme, commonly found in human breast
milk, bile and tears.
'There is just no excuse to allow drug
producing crops to be grown out in
the fields where they can
contaminate the environment and food chain by
spreading their genes
to wild relative and to conventional crops growing
near by. These
pharmaceuticals can be produced in other ways. This rice and
all the
other GE pharm crops out there should be banned and permits for
future open field trials must be revoked,' said Kimberly Wilson, Genetic
Engineering Campaigner for Greenpeace USA.
According to
the information submitted by the company Applied Phytologics
Incorporated (API) to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), eight of the
nine compounds produced in its field trial come from humans, in other
words
from rice engineered with human genes. The USDA imposes
virtually no safety
requirements specific to pharmaceutical crops.
Despite Greenpeace's demand
both the company and the California
Department of Food and Agriculture
failed to act upon the risk.
While the industry is already conducting open-air trials (1) of
pharmaceutical rice, wheat, corn and barley, few regulations to
protect
public health and the environment are in place. The
conventional rice at
risk of GE contamination in California is
exported mainly to Japan and
Turkey. According to information
available to Greenpeace, field trials with
drug producing GE crops
have been also taken place at least in Canada and
France. Twenty
companies world-wide are known to produce pharmaceutical
through GE
crops."
http://www.organicconsumers.org/patent/frankendrugs090701.cfm
OTHER REFERENCES:
Debunking the Myths of Genetic Engineering in Field Crops
http://www.oac.uoguelph.ca/www/CRSC/faculty/eac/myths.htm
Pandora's Pantry
http://www.motherjones.com/mother_jones/JF00/pandora.html
General Information about
Biotechnology Crops
http://www.cast-science.org/biotc_ip.htm
http://www.biotech.ubc.ca/db/bioethics/greenpeace.html
Health Hazards of GM Foods
http://www.soyinfo.com/haz/gehaz.shtml
GE Crop Failure
http://www.netlink.de/gen/Zeitung/1999/990713a.htm
http://www.biotech-info.net/RR_yield_drag_98.pdf
Really Stinky PR
http://www.usatoday.com/news/healthscience/health/2001-09-06-weird-food-gene-usat.htm
Phoenix
: The
Star Phoenix (Saskatoon, Canada)
: May 18, 2002
:
Farmer unveils location of secret GM wheat plots
: Saskatchewan News
Network; Regina Leader-Post
: BY Michelle Lang
:
REGINA -- A Saskatchewan farmer is going public with the
: locations
of two secret sites where researchers are growing
: and
:
testing genetically modified (GM) wheat for the biotech
: company
: Monsanto.
: Marc Loiselle says there are test plots
of GM wheat at
: Agriculture Canada's Scott Research Farm, located in
: west-central
: Saskatchewan, and at Ag-Quest, a private
company located just
: outside of Saskatoon.
:
Monsanto confirmed Friday that Agriculture Canada and Ag-Quest
: are
conducting research trials on its GM wheat. Before
: Loiselle's
revelation, the exact location of Monsanto's many
: GM
:
wheat plots was a closely guarded secret in Canada. Even the
:
Saskatchewan government didn't know exactly where the plots
: were
: located in the province.
: In Europe, activists
protesting biotechnology have destroyed
: GM
: research
crops in recent years.
: "Our No. 1 priority is to protect the
integrity of
: research and
: the researchers," said
Monsanto spokesperson Trish
: Jordan. "It
: is just a good
responsible practice to follow certain
: protocols
: and
one of those is not revealing the locations of these
: trials."
: Loiselle, an organic farmer from Vonda, learned the locations
: from an agronomic committee that he sits on. He believes the
: public has a right to know where the test sites are, so he
: wrote
: letters to the rural municipalities near the
sites. He also
: presented the information in speeches, in a
newsletter
: regarding
: organic production and to the
media.
: "We don't need genetically engineered wheat for any
: number of
: reasons," he said. "Producers will tell you
they do
: not want
: more Roundup Ready products.
Two-thirds of the Canadian Wheat
: Board customers do not want (GM
wheat)."
: Loiselle also argues GM wheat could ruin the organic
wheat
: market. He is one of several farmers who launched a lawsuit
in
: an attempt to prevent the commercial introduction of GM wheat
: into Saskatchewan.
: Officials with the Scott
Research Farm have some concern about
: the security of the research
trials, referring to the
: destruction
: of the research
plots in Europe. But Dr. David Wall said the
: publication of the
sites will not stop the research. He said
: farm officials will
monitor the sites.
: There are 33 Western Canadian sites where
Monsanto is testing
: GM
: wheat this year. Monsanto and
its partners, like Ag-Quest,
: place
: strict controls on
GM wheat research, Jordan said.
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