[BojanaL]

Human population expanded greatly in the last two centuries thanks to technology that makes us healthier, well fed, pleasantly accommodated….
Even thought man already inhabited incredible portion of the planet, he still needs to conquer some more in order to get a room for all of us. Planet size is unchangeable as well as the amount of natural resources we could use. That means that some of us will suffer inevitable consequences for being so numerous. Millions of people all over the globe are starving. Uncultivated land, unpredictable weather conditions, droughts, floods… are to be blamed. If land and weather are satisfying, than weeds and insects are our main concerns. What seemed like good solution for the food crisis came to the scene at the beginning of the ’80 in the past century.

Genetic engineering offered plenty solutions. Diversity of living creatures and their characteristics is inconceivable. Whole genome sequencing allowed us to find and extract genes that could help and improve agriculture a lot. By inserting a couple of new genes we modified plant enough to become stronger, resistant to a pesticides, taught weather conditions or one that could provide more harvest. Antibiotic resistant tobacco, herbicide resistant soybean, corn and cotton, delayed ripening tomato…are the most famous examples of genetically modified food today. Can they solve the question of world hunger? Are they safe? Eco-friendly?

What are the main obstacles with breading and consuming genetically modified organisms? Well, for the start, every time man decided to repair the nature, he ended up with one thing fixed and three other broken. The reason is fragility of natural balance, where every species have certain place and function. We are all deeply connected. Most things in nature resemble chain reaction – if you change just one hoop the rest of the chain will suffer the consequences. Introducing genetically modified (GM) and fortified plant to some area means those “weak” natural plants doesn’t stand a chance. Monocultures are winning the battle with natural diversity. This kind of planting has a lot of other things to be worried about, besides erasing numerous plants from our environment. Herbicide resisting plants are designed to withstand a huge amount of aggressive chemicals that will destroy insects and weeds. Some of those chemicals will be washed away by rain, but most of them will stay on the plant after harvest. Plants will undergo technological modifications before reaching the market (and your table), but you can be sure that beside vitamins and essential nutrients they will enrich your meal with herbicide/pesticide residues. What happens next is that weeds and insects are becoming resistant to the pesticide used so other chemicals had to be manufactured, new transgenic plant created…- vicious circle. Chemicals can harm our health but they are not the only problem in this story. Transgenic plants can induce adverse effect on their own. Experiment with Brazilian nut and bean is perfect example. Nut allergy is one of the most common food allergies in human population. Genes from Brazilian nut were inserted in the bean and transgenic plant was given to the rats. Even thought rats were eating bean, nut allergy was initiated. Few cases proved that transgenic allergy can be induced even if animal is not allergic to plants when they are given separately. And now let’s mix effects of both pesticide and genetic modification in one experiment. French researchers used transgenic corn combined with pesticide residues and experimented for 2 years on 200 rats. Animals were fed with transgenic corn from day one. Blood test (biochemistry, hormone levels…) and histological examinations were performed. Results were devastating. 97% of females developed mammary tumors, while renal tumors dominated in males. In both cases, altered hormonal levels initiated tumor formation. Pesticide affected liver, kidney, embryo… exerting typical toxic effects. Taken together, they shortened animal’s life dramatically. When those two were compared, GM food induced more severe pathologies and killed more animals showing that transgenesis itself could be more harmful then chemical poising.

This is not the first experiment showing how dangerous GM food could be, but it’s still manufactured and sold thought out the world. GM seed manufacturers are demanding a signed promise that it’s not going to be used for experimental purposes. What is that telling you? We don't know how genetically modified food affects human health. As with so many other things - time will show.