Introduction

The genetic modification of crops has become one of the most hotly debated food issues of our time.

GM agriculture has been heralded as a breakthrough for the world by its advocates who are, in the main, scientists, those working for the multi-billion biotechnology industry and farmers.

They claim that GM crops will and do result in higher yields, use fewer chemicals – herbicides and pesticides – and therefore benefit the environment, and provide a solution to world hunger and malnutrition.

Critics, largely made up of environmental, development, consumer and organic farming groups, argue that the newly created species resulting from the technology could behave in unpredictable and uncontrollable ways, threatening existing species and ‘polluting’ the environment as well as having unforeseen impacts on food safety and human health.

They do not believe that GM crops will solve the problems of hunger and malnutrition, pointing to the fact that the world currently produces enough food for everyone’s needs but that it is distributed unevenly.

What is genetic modification?

Genetic modification or engineering enables scientists to create plants, animals and micro-organisms by manipulating genes in a way that does not occur naturally. Genes from one species are inserted into the DNA of another species, and may even include animal genes being inserted into plants.

GM enables scientists to bypass natural selection and evolution by transferring genes from species that would never normally breed together. GM crops are therefore scientifically created new life forms that have never before occurred in nature.

How has genetic modification been applied?

There are currently two main types of genetically modified crops: those engineered to be tolerant to herbicides so that farmers can spray their fields to eliminate weeds without damaging the crop itself and those engineered to produce their own toxins that kill pests or diseases that try to attack the crop.

Advocates of the technology point to the fact that humankind has for centuries been making improvements to crop plants through selective breeding and hybridization - the controlled pollination of plants. They argue that genetic modification is simply an extension of traditional plant breeding techniques and that it allows for the transfer of genetic information in a more precise and controlled way.

Critics argue, however, that genetic engineering is a significant change from past methods of developing crop types as these were based on crossing and selecting from existing and usually related organisms. The new technology enables totally novel combinations of genes, often from unrelated organisms, and therefore totally new combinations of characteristics.

What is the current situation in the UK?

Following a nationwide public consultation on GM crops and farm scale evaluations of three GM crops, the UK government decided to reject the commercial growing of two of the crops on environmental grounds: oilseed rape and sugar beet, but approved the other: GM maize.

However, the company responsible for developing the GM maize, announced shortly afterwards that it was giving up attempts to grow GM maize in the UK. The company claimed that because of strict conditions imposed by the government, the commercial growing of GM maize has become "economically non-viable".

Despite this and particularly in light of the fact that other countries are increasingly growing GM, the question of whether the UK should allow the commercial growing of GM crops is likely to be raised again.

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