Would you eat GM rice containing human genes?
The response to this in GNTIS-run workshops is predictable, so maybe that is the question Greenpeace asked everyone to achieve their figure of 90% of Australians reject GM food. The workshops, however, reveal a very different and contradictory picture.
The launch of Greenpeace’s True Food guide at the Sydney Food Festival this week on the coat-tails of some serious food and political celebrities got a lot of media attention. If you read the stories you might be convinced that 90% of Australians (according to Greenpeace) don’t want to eat GM food. But the picture is more complicated than that and workshops I run exploring the ethics of GM food and the associated technologies contradict these generalised – often misleading, even meaningless – opinion polls.
So I want to take you on an interesting three-year adventure I have had running workshops for some interesting people and groups who have delved beyond the standard for and against arguments about GM crops, subjected themselves to self-scrutiny and horrified themselves about their ancestral links with plants and other critters.
I have conducted these workshops for teachers, secondary students, Rotary clubs U3A (University of the Third Age – very cool bunch of people too), and other community groups such as gardening and naturalist clubs, enough groups and people to reveal an established pattern about our thoughts on GM foods and the technologies behind them. There was consistency in their response regardless of the group and age and, as mentioned, it contradicts most of the basic opinion polls about public attitudes to this technology.
The caveat here is that there was not a scientifically robust methodology attached to how I conducted these workshops, nor in the collection or analysis of the data, so there needs to be a grain of caution in what I about to tell you. Next year I hope to conduct these workshops in a methodically robust way and get data that means you can dispense with much of that caution.
So would you eat rice genetically modified with human genes – two to be precise? If you are like nearly all workshop participants, your answer will be no. Or to put it in the context of how I ask the question you will find it an unacceptable way to use this technology. This is an expected and reasonable response. The interesting stuff comes out when you explore why and how this compares to their responses to other examples of GM crops.
As part of the introductory talk the workshop participants learnt the basics of DNA. I put up a slide with the info below to illustrate that all living things have DNA and that all DNA is made of the same stuff.
All living things share at least some genes.
Based on your genes, this is how related you are to….
•A chimpanzee: 96%
•A mouse: 80%
•A fruit fly: 66%
•A cabbage: about 40%
Then I ask people to place themselves on what I call the morality line. One end is the acceptable the other unacceptable based on how acceptable you find the use of the technology to create a specific GM food or crop.
We look at four examples: Rice modified to contain vitamin A or iron; a pest-resistant (Bt) cotton; cereal crops modified to be drought tolerant, and finally rice modified with human genes.
For a start I want their gut reaction so the only information they have about the crop is what is above. Then we explore the various arguments, concerns and thoughts people have and why they have them, and along the way I explain more about the crop and how/why it was developed. It is a great way for people to see different perceptions and what is driving them.
The initial gut reaction for the first two examples will see a spread across the morality line slightly leaning toward the acceptable end, though usually with a small bulge in the middle for the fence-sitters. As we explore the arguments, issues and concerns, many people will change their position on the line; some toward the acceptable end, others go the opposite direction. A person’s position on the line for one example is not indicative of where they will be for the next example. They will and do change. There are various reasons, but the underlying reason for all is that a person will suddenly find the risks more acceptable or less from one crop to the other.
When presented with the drought-tolerant example, nearly all, especially the students, moved to the acceptable end. When asked what distinguishes this crop from the others, the most common answer is that we have climate changes and serious drought and whatever risks exist they are acceptable in this situation.
Now what about ‘humanised rice’?
As mentioned, with the exception of a few mavericks, nearly all participants wedge themselves as far toward the unacceptable end as possible for this example. Why are they here? Why is this so different to the other crops? Without even being there you could guess that it is the use of human genes as the obvious cause. It is a line we shouldn’t cross apparently. Cannibalism is the frequent association.
Then I explain that the two human genes in the rice code for antimicrobial proteins found in our saliva and tear ducts and that these proteins are to be extracted and used as a drug to treat dysentery and related diseases. It will not be grown as a food. About half will move to the acceptable side with that news. Again why the move: because we don’t have to eat it; because it is a drug that will help people…and similar sentiments.
But we do still have to eat it, if we take it as a drug. Ah, but to varying degrees we nearly all draw a distinction between the technology being used for medical purposes and it being used for food production.
And for the others still stuck up the unacceptable end. Why are you still here, I ask? There is still the same, quite rational, psychological hurdle of the fact it is human genes. So, I try and throw spanner in the spokes by suggesting that they ingest 25,000 human genes whenever they kiss someone, share a drink bottle, or simply shake someone’s hand. In the rice example, you are only consuming the protein products of the genes and then only two of them. So what is the difference? You share about 30-40% of your genes with a cabbage. Does this mean you are going to excise the percentage of your cabbage, or any other vegetable, that contains human genes before you eat it?
There will be a couple that might move to the fence-sitting position, but on the whole this is one big psychological hurdle for people. “It is doing my head in,” was one comment from a woman from a gardening club. Her rational brain was at war with her intuitive or instinctive brain and it was getting bloody.
The key points that come from these workshops, however, is that you can’t say 90% of people won’t eat GM food, because we don’t think like that. We naturally assess each crop and make a judgment about its acceptability, a judgement that will differ from one crop to the next. That judgment, for nearly all people, is not based on the technology itself, but on the crop and its purpose. That is, we judge how acceptable we find the risks when weighed against the perceived benefits. And everyone judges risk differently.
Company producing the GM rice – Ventria Bioscience
Jason Major