CHAPTER 13BIOSAFETY Issues

Biosafety Attempts to regulate all activities involving genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and products made from them.

Biosafety law is necessary to promote biotech development and use in a safe and responsible manner.

The Biosafety Protocol to offer significant opportunities for regulator harmonisation and facilitation of trade in biotechnology products for agriculture.

GMO issues During last 10 years, whether tolerated or

permitted of genetically modified microorganisms (GMOs) and their nucleic acids into various environments has increased worldwide.

According to 1996 World Health Organisation (WHO) Report, has been an increase in frequency of outbreaks of new and reemerging infectious diseases.

Moreover, current pathogen strains are often resistant to known treatments, some even to nearly all commonly used antibiotics and hence of the changes and spread of antibiotics resistance genes.

Controversies on GMO Focus on human and environmental safety

Labeling and consumer choice Intellectual property rights Ethics Food security Poverty reduction Environmental conservation

Does the GMO technology itself or the use of specific GMOs, has increased the likelihood of unsafe food?

What are the potential threats to the environment and how do these compare with the technology that is replaced?

Do biotech companies have the market power to extract excessive profits from farmers, especially those in poor countries?

Why they concern about GMO? Allergenicity

Transfer a gene from Brazil nut into soybean to improve nutritional quality

May transfer proteins from one food source to another, transferring the allergenic properties of food from the donor to the host plant

Marker gene A maker gene confer to antibiotics resistance Worry would transfer this gene to human,

pathogenic microbes Have negative effects on efficiency of some

antibiotics use in medical Nowadays, they insert with Green Floresence

Protein (GFP) gene

There is legitimate fear that the marker genes for antibiotic resistance found in transgenic plants might be transferred to pathogenic organisms, thereby reducing the clinical efficacy of antibiotics for treating human diseases.

Antibiotic markergene from food

Horizontal gene transfer

Natural Antibiotic Resistance soil and gut

microorganisms

Transformed antibiotic-resistant gut microorganisms

Development of antibiotic-resistant pathogens

Bioluminescence is the production and emission of light by a living organism as the result of a chemical reaction during which chemical energy is converted to light energy.

Ethical Transfer a gene from a pig into other organisms

Vegetables contains DNA copies from a pig gene

There are ethical dilemma and debated emotively

Agricultural

Development of resistance in target species when used of herbicides and pesticide resistant In changing environment, natural selection mechanisms

encourage the development f populations to deal with the new environment

Creation of super-weed or super-bug Plants become weeds if they survive beyond their

economic life or disburse seeds that can germinate and interfere with an alternate crop in the next growing period.

Genetic flow Genetic flow is the movement of genetic material from

one species to a different species. 2 genetic flow concerns

a) movement of the antibiotic resistance marker genes to microorganisms in the stomachs of animals that eat a GM crop

b) plant protectant genes to wild relatives of the GM crop, these novel genes will be passed from crops to weeds.

Risks of non-target organisms Nontarget insects or plants might also be

affected by the mechanism of the GMO Birds, fish, mammals, arthropods and others

might suffer population if their food supply is reduced.

Loss of antibiotic effectiveness Kanamycin resistance gene (NptII) is the most

widely used as a marker genes Will cause the plant to produce a substance

that inactivates an antibiotic or a herbicide

Flora and fauna A new species may be more competitive than native flora and fauna

Impact on native ecosystems if they release into environment

A long time risks Nobody knows for long term effect

Dr Arpad Puztai, research on safety of GM Food His experiment showed that rats fed on GM potatoes had suffered serious damage to their immune systems and shown stunted growth

GM companies and politicians critics on his results

Monsanto co. claimed that there is no different between GM and conventional food

There have no commercially available GM foods that can be disproved or proved to pose a risk to human health

Immunologists tested GM Pea shown to cause an allergic reaction in mice

Golden Rice enriched with vitamin A Public claimed only can help rich people

GM crops will force farmers to be dependent on GM companies

Greenpeace critics and condemn this GM crops as a ploy

Assumptions about the survival and transfer abilities of GMOs GMOs can survive or transfer their transgene to

indigenous organisms

DNA is more stable than has been hitherto imagined

DNA taken up with food is not completely degraded in the gastrointestinal tract but has rather been found to enter white blood cells and spleen and liver cells

DNA can be transferred to the cells of foetuses as has been shown in newborn mice. Here transfer probably took place via the placenta.

Anti-GMO Group GMOs have unrevealed human health effects

GMOs have harmful effects on our ecosystem Making superweeds & superbugs Disturbing our ecosystem Violating the rule of nature

GMOs have unjust socio-economic effects Increased cost burden to farmers and consumers The environment injustice for poor people in our society and the

world

GMOs have armful effects on rural societies Strengthening agribusiness monopoly power on global food system Dsdtroying agricultural biodiversity the very base of our

agricultural and rural sustainability

GMOs raise severe moral issues Blurring the boundary among the animals, plants and microoragnims Breaking the wholeness of the life

Anti-GMO movement for expelling GMOs out of the earth Resisting bio-patent and biopiracy

Suggesting alternative development path

Consumer PERCEPTIONS and ATTITUDES about BIOTECHNOLOGY

GM Food should be very carefully evaluated for potential health effects

Do you Eat “GM” Foods?

Thank you…..