Distrust of GM Foods: Addressing Crisis of Confidence

Author(s): Suman Sahai

Source: Economic and Political Weekly , Jun. 5-11, 2004, Vol. 39, No. 23 (Jun. 5-11,
2004), pp. 2340-2341
Published by: Economic and Political Weekly

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4415113

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industries, as in the case of the automobile required
intensive effort to bolster the technological at various levels to ease the
industry, to ensure that consumption of bottlenecks in other domains. Technology
capability for the production of world
steel is not replaced by substitutes. The class steel through investment in R and is
D,a fundamental determinant of growth in
auto sector in India is booming but the as a combined effort by the government an open economy. The vast domestic market
share of domestic steel in auto manufac- and industry to achieve cost competi- remains untapped and unlocking this po-
tential would be possible only through a
ture is far from satisfactory. HR coils tiveness. This implies that only efficient
major technological effort. [HI1
produced locally are not suitable for auto firms can remain in business. Of course,
manufacture and have to be largely im- interventions (which are many) will be [The views expressed here are personal.]
ported for further processing into down-
stream products for use in the auto sector.
Housing is one area where there is scope
for increasing steel consumption, although
in the construction sector demand for steel Distrust of GM Foods
is currently on the rise because of the
ongoing infrastructure p,'ojects undertaken
by the government. Addressing Crisis of Confidence
In an industry faced with competition
from imports, rising cost of inputs, high The real reasons for the many strands of resistance to GM foods
energy and transportation costs in addition
to a small domestic market, new techno-
will have to be understood and taken on board if the current
logies and value added products provide impasse is to be bridged. To allow a fair and critical evaluation of
the way forward. It is through the techno- GM technology, policy-making in this area will have to be open to
logy route that it will be possible to achieve
public scrutiny.
technical efficiency to become globally
competitive, reduce costs to enhance de-
mand, meet the challenge of the rise in raw SUMAN SAHAI associated with genetic manipulation,
material cost, counter pressures from sub- which is expressing itself as a rejection of
stitutes like cement, aluminium and plas- In the past couple of years, all manner genetically manipulated crops. The gen-
tics, move up the value chain and also set of organisations, especially industry esis of the opposition to GM foods is to
out the map for future investment. Tech- federations, have begun to call brain- be found in Europe and with reason.
nology has also a significant role to play storming sessions on biotechnology. Public distrust of GM foods is currently
in safeguarding the environment. The future The usually well-attended meetings with most visible in Europe, especially Britain,
course of investments is to be dictated a focus on GM crops, indicate the entre- where public action succeeded in getting
among other things by technological con- preneurial interest in this new technology. Bayer CropScience, a multinational con-
siderations, so that the industry can move Civil society groups are sometimes invited cern, to withdraw its GM corn from UK.
up the value chain. While shop-floor in- to present their concerns at such meetings It is not so bad in the US, although con-
novations and in-house R and D contribute but this does not normally happen unless sumer concerns have been voiced and
to cost-cutting, there is a need for a large there has been some pressure, either international NGOs like Friends of the
corpus of funds for undertaking key because of a protest or a strongly worded Earth and Greenpeace have carried the
projects, which can benefit the industry as comment in the media. protest against GM foods across the
a whole and take it to a higher growth path. An increasing number of Indian NGOsAtlantic. There is a reason why, unlike
The pooling would be beneficial not only are becoming quite vocal in their criticismEurope, public acceptance of GM foods
from the finance angle but also in terms ofof GM technology, chiefly GM crops. Many is higher in the US. Surveys have been
collective R and D by a pool of techno- do little more than making sensational state-conducted which show that respondents
logists and scientists. As the investment ments, expressing a gut-level rejection;are willing to eat GM foods and do not
required would be sizeable, intra-industry others are well-informed and analytical, feel threatened by it.
cooperation is essential for achievingbasing their criticism on an analysis of the
success. In Europe, prior to the formation facts. Apart from the reaction from civil
GM Foods and Europe
of the EEC, the European Coal and Steel society organisations, individual view-
Commission was formed with the explicit points are being heard from a variety of age Perhaps one reason for this is that US
purpose of consolidating the fragmented groups and backgrounds against GM foods.citizens do not distrust their government
steel industry in the region. In the measures The reaction of Indian civil society is inon this subject the way Europeans distrust
adopted to achieve this extremely difficult consonance with international resist- their governments. When the technology
of recombinant DNA was established and
task, technology was in the vanguard. ance and a common perception that GM
Baosteel of China not only makes steel but foods are bad. Why is that so? It is im- its potential for applications in agriculture
also capital equipment for the manufacture portant to understand the anatomy of the and pharmaceuticals began to unfold,
of steel, which has significant implications resistance against GM foods since it isAmerican
a scientists and regulatory agen-
for diffusion of technology. strong and valid resistance. In particular,cies
it conducted a series of public discus-
To sum up, hastening the pace of growth needs to be understood that apart from sions called the Asilomar conferences in
of the manufacturing sector, and a tech- scientific concerns, principally related theto early 1970s. These discussions inclu-
nology-centric push to the industry have the environment and human and animalded an analysis of the risks and benefits
to be the key elements if the pressures of health, there are ethical, social and eco-
of this exciting new technology by which
cyclical fluctuations in the steel industry nomic concerns as well. In addition, there
genes could be shifted around across the
are to be contained. There has to be an is an emotional and historical baggage
species barrier. The public was included

2340Economic and Political Weekly June 5, 2004

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in the debate to quite an extent. Unlike in and law-abiding citizens applauded as fields understood and taken on board if the current
the US, European nations did not engage with GM crops were destroyed in the UK. impasse is to be bridged and dialogue is
in such an exercise. Discussions with the In a final blow, the courts let off those to continue to some point of resolution.
public were not held. Scientists remained charged with tearing up fields planted with It is silly for protagonists of the technology
in ivory towers doing science and the public GM crops. The protest gradually began to to accuse the public of simplicity. There
was not aware of what was happening in spread across the world. is no point in charging people who protest,
the laboratories. They feared the worst - These are some of the reasons why GM with ignorance, chiefly because that is
perhaps monsters were being hatched intechnology is being treated with suspicion usually untrue. It also serves little purpose
test-tubes. in the west. On top of this, it does not help to go on about how the public cannot
In addition to this, in some sections of at all that the technology is controlled understand the complex technicality of the
Europe, there is distrust, even aversion, to almost entirely by six mega-corporations subject or that there are vested interests
the science of genetics and genetic who have styled themselves life science behind the lobbying positions of NGOs.
engineering, strongest perhaps in countries corporations, the most notorious of which This last is most often heard in the context
like Germany and the Netherlands. During is Monsanto. Actually, there are somewhat ofBt cotton, which is supposed to decrease
the Nazi regime, Germans saw the science more complex issues involved in the pesticide use because the Bt toxin is sup-
of genetics abused in the name of eugenics, European rejection of this science. John posed to function as an in-built pesticide
Hitler's mad and rotten plan for racial Durant, a public policy analyst in the UK, in the cotton crop. GM 'wallahs' charge
cleansing. Genetically 'inferior' races like points out that even though GM food that the pesticide lobby is using NGOs to
gypsies were gassed along with the geneti- technology is science-based and strategi- resist Bt cotton so that pesticide sales can
cally 'inferior' Jews (over 6 million ofcally significant, itis out-of-step with public continue unabated. This is a juvenile ar-
them) in death chambers. Many in opinion, particularly in highly industria- gument and invokes ridicule.
Germany's scientific community supported lised western Europe. According to him, Accusations by biotech supporters that
Hitler's views, and some German geneti-citizens of industrial democracies are there are maverick, irresponsible scientists
cists were partners in the unspeakable essentially sceptical. They tend to be well who put out unscientific data and scare the
crimes of the Third Reich. Understand- public and that the media is interested in
informed and access data efficiently, they
ably, for Germans today, genetics isare a mindful of special interests, distrustful
nothing but exaggerating and sensationalising
tainted science, its manipulation for anyof governments and disinclined to defer issues it does not understand, adds nothing
purpose undesirable. to the opinion of experts who they do notto the credibility of the biotech lobby.
Burdened with this past, people in hold in any special awe. Hounding Arpad Puzstai, the scientist at
European countries had to suffer the abomi- Rowett Institute, for showing a possible
nations of the food scandals stemming Lack of Credibility health danger from GM potatoes or pillo-
from the mad cow disease (Bovine rying Chapela and Quist for reporting that
Spongiform Encephalopathy), when the If one looks for a common thread in the GM corn had contaminated native corn in
British government defended infected beefattitudes to GM technology in the indus- Mexico is finally counter-productive.
trial or developing countries, it is seen in
as perfectly safe for human consumption. Aggressive assertions in the face of public
Then the link was shown to a human the striking lack of credibility of the apprehensions that all is well in the world
purveyors of this technology. The govern- of GM technology, will continue to back-
disorder called Jacob- Creuzfeldt syndrome
ments are disbelieved and the industry is fire. Public relations efforts undertaken at
and all hell broke loose. The British govern-
ment was shown to be lying to its people resented for its monopoly. Monsanto has great cost by companies like Monsanto
and engaged in a cover-up exercisesoto attracted the ire of civil society for its ($ 50 mn, according to the grapevine) have
attempts to promote the so-called 'termi- not transported them an inch out of the
protect beef revenues at the cost of risking
this technology that it has been made the doghouse, simply because they failed to
the health and lives of its people. As ifnator'
was not enough, close on the heels of the
Frankenstein of corporations. The aggres- address the real issues and the crisis of
beef scandal came the revelation, long sive intellectual property rights regime confidence that they face.
denied, that dioxin-laced animal feedpushedwas by the corporations has raised the To break down the barriers and allow
fed to cattle in Belgium. What made hackles of even moderate campaigners. a fair and critical evaluation of GM tech-
everything unsupportable was the denial Apart from this crisis of confidence, nology, policy-making in this area will
by the government and regulatory authori-there is the fully understandable resistance have to be open to public scrutiny. Equity
ties that there was no wrongdoing, there of consumers. The fact is that GM products and justice will have to define regimes for
was no dioxin. The trust between govern- do not show any overwhelming advantage intellectual property protection. Risk-bene-
ment and people, if any was left afterover theconventional foods. They are not better fit analysis must be conducted in an open
mad cow terror, vanished. In the eyes of more nutritious or cheaper. It is not as and transparent manner. Monitoring of
tasting,
the people, specially the radicals, the though this technology has increased the field trials should be done by independent
government lied routinely to the people choice or quality of foods available. With experts and include NGOs. The informed
and could not be trusted. none of these advantages on offer, the con- public will have to become a partner in the
Against this backdrop came GM techno- sumer has to deal with fears of safety of the GM dialogue and in decision-making. The
logy and the effort to market GM foods. food, whether real or imagined, and possible agenda of research on GM crops will have
The government said it was safe. The damage to the environment, if not today, to be determined after consultations with
regulatory authorities said it was safe. perhaps tomorrow. For the average person, stakeholders. In India and the developing
Nobody believed a word. The crescendo GM foods do not offer any overwhelming world, the system for regulation, monitor-
of the protests rose. NGOs like Friends of advantages. There are no tangible benefits ing and oversight of GM technology must
the Earth and Greenpeace took up cudgels but there may be quite serious risks. be entrusted to people with the highest
on behalf of what was seen as a people The real reasons for the many strands of technical skills, and not handed over to a
betrayed by their government. Activists resistance to GM foods will have to be clutch of bureaucrats as at present. [1U1

Economic and Political Weekly June 5, 2004 2341

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