from the methyltransferase-overexpressing lines contain65 IU of vitamin E. Because 100 IU is the recommendedminimum therapeutic dose to decrease the risk of heartdisease, the work of Van Eenennaam et al. has done muchto increase the nutraceutical potential of plant-derivedvitamin E.

Until now, transgenic experiments have not beenreported with the gene encoding TC. However, it is likelythat similar degrees of success will be seen when theinvestigations are reported. The ability to manipulate thethree tocopherol-composition-regulating enzymes shouldallow for the tailoring of plant tissues with novel tocopherolcomposition. Therefore, in addition to nutritionalapplications, plants can also be engineered to accumu-late g-, b- and d-tocopherol, which all have superiorin vitro antioxidant activities to a-tocopherol [11], for thedevelopment of antioxidants for food processing andindustrial applications.

Concluding remarks

Through the combined efforts of several groups [1,2,4,13], aclear picture has emerged that identifies enzymatic stepsregulating quantitative and qualitative changes in plant-tissue tocol pools. This information is now being exploited byplant breeders and genetic engineers to develop plants withelevated vitamin E content. Although fiscal gains have beenone of the primary motivating forces behind these efforts,altruistic aims have also driven the research. Specifically,groups are interested in developing foods that have beenbiofortified with vitamin E. The rationale is that althoughmost people can obtain sufficient amounts of vitamin E froma typical diet, current foods do not provide the therapeuticlevels of vitamin E that would allow the public to enjoy theadded health benefits of this vitamin. Biofortified plantswould provide a sustainable alternative to a prescribedregimen of vitamin E supplementation that would beavailable to everyone, regardless of income or class.

References

1 Institute of Medicine (2000) Dietary Reference Intakes for Vitamin C,Vitamin E, Selenium, and Carotenoids, National Academies Press

2 Grusak, M.A. and Dellapenna, D. (1999) Improving the nutrientcomposition of plants to enhance human nutrition and health. Annu.Rev. Plant Physiol. Plant Mol. Biol. 50, 133–161

3 Furuya, T. et al. (1987) Production of tocopherols in cell culture ofsafflower. Phytochemistry 26, 2741–2747

4 Moshe, R. et al. (1989) Accumulation of a-tocopherol in senescingorgans as related to chlorophyll degradation. Plant Physiol. 89,1028–1030

5 Tsegaye, Y. et al. (2002) Overexpression of the enzymes p-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase in Arabidopsis and itsrelationship to tocopherol biosynthesis. Plant Physiol. Biochem.40, 913–920

6 Falk, J. et al. (2003) Constitutive overexpression of barley4-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase in tobacco results inelevation of vitamin E content in seeds but not in leaves. FEBSLett. 540, 35–40

7 Estevez, J.M. (2001) 1-deoxy-d-xylulose-5-phosphate synthase, a limit-ing enzyme for plastidic isoprenoid biosynthesis in plants. J. Biol.Chem. 276, 22901–22909

8 Collakova, E. and Dellapenna, D. (2003) Homogentisate phytyltrans-ferase activity is limiting for tocopherol biosynthesis in Arabidopsis.Plant Physiol. 131, 632–642

9 Savige, B. et al. (2002) Isolation and characterization of homogentisatephytyltransferase from synechocystis sp. Pcc 6803 and Arabidopsis.Plant Physiol. 129, 321–332

10 Cahoon, E.B. et al. (2003) Metabolic redesign of vitamin E biosynthesisin plants for tocotrienol production and increased antioxidant content.Nat. Biotechnol. 21, 1082–1087

11 Kamal-Eldin, A. and Appelqvist, L.A. (1996) The chemistry andantioxidant properties of tocopherols and tocotrienols. Lipids 31,671–701

12 Theriault, A. et al. (1999) Tocotrienol: a review of its therapeuticpotential. Clin. Biochem. 32, 309–319

13 Van Eenennaam, A.L. et al. (2003) Engineering vitamin E content:from Arabidopsis mutant to soy oil. Plant Cell 15, 3007–3019

0167-7799/$ - see front matter q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.tibtech.2004.01.008

How can genetically modified foods be made publiclyacceptable?

Gene Rowe

Institute of Food Research, Norwich Research Park, Colney, Norwich NR4 7UA, UK

A recent study by Lusk suggests that consumers might

voluntarily pay more for a genetically modified (GM)

food than a non-GM equivalent if made aware of the

possible health benefits. However, other research indi-

cates that the acceptability of novel hazards is affected

by a variety of factors, in addition to benefits, and that

making agricultural biotechnology publicly acceptable

will be more complex than indicated by the results from

Lusk’s study.

A recent paper by Lusk indicates that consumers could bewilling to pay extra for a genetically modified (GM) foodthan a non-GM equivalent if told of the potential healthbenefits they might receive from eating it [1]. Indeed, asLusk states in a Purdue newsletter (http://news.uns.purdue.edu/html4ever/031024.Lusk.rice.html), ‘This studyis one of the first to show that people are willing to pay apremium for a food that’s been improved using bio-technology.’

Lusk attributes this result – which is contrary to pastfindings – to the emphasis of his study being on thepotential benefits of GM food from a consumer’s, ratherCorresponding author: Gene Rowe (gene.rowe@bbsrc.ac.uk).

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than a producer’s, perspective. Notably, the first gener-ation of GM products has come from technologies that havetended to benefit farmers, such as Roundup Ready Crops(http://www.monsanto.ca/products/roundupready/crops/canola/index.shtml), rather than consumers, who ‘…havebeen asked to take a risk without any benefit to them at all’(http://news.uns.purdue.edu/html4ever/031024.Lusk.rice.html). However, the next generation of GM foods willprovide direct benefits (such as improved nutritionalquality or enhanced shelf life) to the consumer and,hence – Lusk’s research suggests – might be moreacceptable. This article will argue that making GM foodspublicly acceptable is likely to be much more complex thansimply communicating their benefits.

Public concern about GM foods and crops

Genetically modified foods and crops have many potentialbenefits (which will not be discussed here), not only forfarmers and producers but also for consumers. Manypeople in many countries, however, do not appear to eithersupport or want this technology. For example, evidencefrom supplementary surveys from recent Eurobarometeropinion polls (conducted twice-yearly in all member statesof the European Union to monitor social and politicalattitudes) hint at the extent of concern [2]. In one of thelatest Eurobarometer studies (from 1999), public supportfor GM crops ranged from ‘weak support’ to ‘opposition’. Bycontrast, for GM foods, the samples from all except two ofthe 17 countries polled exhibited either ‘opposition’ or‘strong opposition’. Furthermore, opposition to both GMcrops and foods has increased in most countries since anearlier poll in 1996 [3].

More recently, in 2003, a major government-sponsoredpublic debate in the UK regarding the commercializationof GM foods and crops (http://www.gmpublicdebate.org.uk/ut_09/ut_9_6.htm) also concluded that the public do notwant the technology and would not buy its produce,although the validity of this claim has been challenged onthe basis of the unrepresentativeness of the participants[4]. Even in the developing world, there has been evidenceof public, or at least governmental, resistance, with aidshipments of GM maize from the World Food Programme(http://www.wfp.org/) being initially refused in 2002 byZambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi and Mozambique, even in theface of public starvation (http://allafrica.com/sustainable/stories/200210040462.html).

In light of this evidence, the results from the work ofLusk [1] initially appear hopeful – if one accepts that thereare benefits from the technology – although there arevarious reasons why we should be cautious in reading toomuch into them.

Cross-cultural differences and the generalizability of

Lusk’s results

One reason to question the generalizability of Lusk’sresults concerns the nature of the subjects used in hisstudy. As already indicated, the general public in differentcountries are by no means identical in their support of, oropposition to, GM foods and crops [3]. Consequently, weneed to consider where North Americans – who comprisedLusk’s sample – generally stand on this issue. The

differences between North American and European reac-tions to agricultural biotechnology have been discussed byGaskell et al. in an aptly entitled article: ‘Troubled waters:the Atlantic divide on biotechnology policy’ [5]. Theauthors note the importance of the earlier start by theUSA compared with Europe in developing biotechnology,and describe subsequent differences in the way in whichthe technology has come to be regulated. They alsohighlight interesting differences between the ways inwhich the European and North American media havereported agricultural biotechnology issues. The former istypified by a greater diversity of reporting, in whichdifferent perspectives and the opinions of a variety ofprotagonists are discussed, whereas the latter is typifiedby a greater emphasis on the industrial perspective andfocuses on writing ‘the truth’ rather than ‘opinion’ (see alsoRef. [6]). Importantly, the authors discuss evidencesuggesting that the European public is somewhat lessenthusiastic about the contribution of technology toeveryday life than the North American public, with arelatively greater confidence in the benefits of agriculturalbiotechnology in North America compared with strongerconcerns about the risks and uncertainties of the tech-nology in Europe.

These differences raise the possibility that the rela-tively less sceptical American subjects used by Lusk mighthave been more amenable to positive information onbenefits than Europeans or, indeed, people from otherparts of the world would have been. As such, the success ofefforts focusing on communicating benefits in the waydescribed by Lusk cannot be guaranteed outside of NorthAmerica (or even within it).

Technology acceptance is not just about potential

benefits

Although the perceived benefits associated with technol-ogies such as GM foods and crops are likely to be importantin determining their public acceptability, knowledge of theamount or extent of benefits alone is not sufficient todetermine public reaction. The story is more complex thanthat, and requires consideration of the perceived risks ofthe technology. Intuitively, risks and benefits should beindependent. Indeed, technologies that offer benefitsmight be risky (the car), or relatively risk-free (certainvaccines). However, research suggests that people tend toperceive an inverse relationship between risks andbenefits [7,8], although it has been suggested that ifperceptions of the risks related to any potential hazard ortechnology are sufficiently high, no amount of benefits areliable to make it acceptable [9]. Hence, the risk–benefitrelationship is not so straightforward.

Furthermore, the very issue of what people understandby the term ‘risk’ is complicated by the perceptualmultidimensionality of the concept. Research has demon-strated that people do not perceive the risk of hazardsaccording to a single dimension related to predictedinjuries or fatalities – akin to a risk assessor’s viewpoint– but interpret risk according to several independentperceptual factors. For example, early research on riskperception, considering a range of diverse technologies andhazards, suggested that there are three factors, or

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dimensions, of risk. These have been termed ‘dread’,‘familiarity’ and ‘number of people exposed’ [10]. Otherresearch looking at food technologies and hazards haveuncovered similar dimensions, which have been termed‘severity’, ‘number of people exposed’ and ‘unknown risks’[11], but also at least one different dimension related to‘naturalness’ [12]. In other words, if we take the commonlyfound dimension of familiarity or unknown risks, what thismeans is that people might judge a technology to be ‘risky’if they know little about it and/or they perceive thatscience and scientists know little about it. Essentially, insuch studies, benefits appear to correlate (or correlatenegatively) with one of the risk factors alone. Thisemphasizes the need to understand more about people’sperceptions than simply how they see the benefits of thetechnology, to determine how they perceive its risks and,therefore, to a degree, its acceptability.

Recent research on GM foods and crops has uncoveredsimilar themes to the more generic research discussed. Forexample, Grove-White et al. used qualitative researchmethods to study perceptions of GM foods, uncoveringconcerns that the technology involves ‘meddling withnature’, that safety issues are difficult to identify and arelikely to be long term (hinting at the familiarity orunknown risks dimension), and concerns that the tech-nology might ultimately permeate all foods, removingpersonal choice [13]. Other research has identified similarthemes in risk perception of the technology [14–16]. Thisimplies that any attempt by GM technology advocates toaddress public lack of acceptance needs to consider suchfactors in addition to addressing the communication ofbenefits.

Who will communicate information? The issue of trust

One other issue that technology advocates need to considerin trying to encourage acceptance of GM foods and crops isthe issue of trust. Information on benefits and risks mustcome from a source, and if that source is distrusted, itmatters little how full or persuasive their information is.Indeed, hazard acceptability has been linked empiricallywith both risk perception and level of trust [17].Unfortunately, research indicates that GM promoters(e.g. industrial and governmental) are not particularlywell trusted [18,19], and until this is addressed, findingslike those from Lusk might be difficult to apply.

A piece of the puzzle

In conclusion, Lusk’s recent study is useful in providingone piece of the puzzle for advancing public acceptance of apotentially valuable new technology. For this it should becommended, although, at the same time, its significanceshould not be overestimated. Cross-cultural differences inperceptions are liable to require different, targeted

communication approaches from technology advocatesthat must be informed by a deeper understanding of theother factors related to technology acceptance; in particu-lar, the complex way in which people perceive risk, andtheir attitudes towards information communicators.

AcknowledgementsG.R. acknowledges funding from the Core Strategic Grant of the UKBiotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.

References

1 Lusk, J.L. (2003) Effects of cheap talk on consumer willingness-to-payfor golden rice. Am. J. Agric. Econ. 85, 840–856

2 Gaskell, G., Bauer, M.W. eds (2001) Biotechnology 1996–2000: theYears of Controversy, Science Museum

3 Gaskell, J. et al. (2001) In the public eye: representations ofbiotechnology in Europe. In Biotechnology 1996–2000: the Years ofControversy (Gaskell, G. and Bauer, M.W., eds), pp. 53–79, ScienceMuseum

4 Campbell, S. and Townsend, E. (2003) Flaws undermine results of UKbiotech debate. Nature 425, 559

5 Gaskell, G. et al. (2001) Troubled waters: the Atlantic divide onbiotechnology policy. In Biotechnology 1996–2000: the Years ofControversy (Gaskell, G. and Bauer, M.W., eds), pp. 96–115, ScienceMuseum

6 Bauer, M.W. et al. (2001) The dramatisation of biotechnology in elitemass media. In Biotechnology 1996–2000: the Years of Controversy(Gaskell, G. and Bauer, M.W., eds), pp. 35–52, Science Museum

7 Alhakami, A.S. and Slovic, P. (1994) A psychological study of theinverse relationships between perceived risks and perceived benefits.Risk Anal. 14, 1085–1096

8 Finucane, M.L. et al. (2000) The affect heuristic in judgments of risksand benefits. J. Behav. Decis. Making 13, 1–17

9 Hansen, J. et al. (2003) Beyond the knowledge deficit: recent researchinto lay and expert attitudes to food risks. Appetite 41, 111–121

10 Slovic, P. et al. (1980) Facts and fears: understanding perceived risks.In Societal Risk Assessment: How Safe is Safe Enough? (Schwing, R.and Albers, W.A., eds), pp. 181–216, Plenum

11 Sparks, P. and Shepherd, R. (1994) Public perceptions of the potentialhazards associated with food-production and food-consumption: Anempirical study. Risk Anal. 14, 799–806

12 Fife-Schaw, C. and Rowe, G. (1996) Public perceptions of everyday foodhazards: a psychometric study. Risk Anal. 16, 487–500

13 Grove-White, R. et al. (1997) Uncertain world: Genetically ModifiedOrganisms, Food and Public Attitudes in Britain, Lancaster University

14 Miles, S. and Frewer, L.J. (2001) Investigating specific concerns aboutdifferent food hazards. Food Qual. Prefer. 12, 47–61

15 Boulter, D. (1997) Scientific and public perception of plant geneticmanipulation – a critical review. Crit. Rev. Plant Sci. 16, 231–251

16 Frewer, L.J. et al. (1997) Public concerns in the United Kingdom aboutgeneral and specific applications of genetic engineering: risk, benefit,and ethics. Sci. Technol. Human Values 22, 98–124

17 Eiser, J.R. et al. (2002) Trust, perceived risk, and attitudes toward foodtechnologies. J. Appl. Soc. Psychol. 32, 2423–2433

18 Finucane, M.L. (2002) Mad cows, mad corn and mad communities: therole of socio-cultural factors in the perceived risk of genetically-modified food. Proc. Nutr. Soc. 61, 31–37

19 Rosati, S. and Saba, A. (2000) Factors influencing the acceptance offood biotechnology. Ital. J. Food Sci. 12, 425–434

0167-7799/$ - see front matter q 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.tibtech.2004.01.007

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