How Corporate PR Campaigns
Stifle Debate Over Biotech

SPINNING SCIENCE INTO GOLD

<http://www.tompaine.com/opinion/2001/08/02/index.html>
August 2001

How Industry's Public-Relations Campaigns Stifle Debate Over Biotechnology

Karen Charman is an investigative journalist specializing in agriculture,
health and the environment.

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in Sierra, the national
magazine of the Sierra Club.

When research scientist Arpad Pusztai appeared on British television in
August 1998 to talk about his studies of genetically engineered potatoes,
he was suspended and later fired from his job at the Rowett Research
Institute in Scotland. After a distinguished 36-year career there, his
research was terminated, his data seized, and a contract clause was invoked
that put his pension in jeopardy. At that point, the contract became a gag
order forbidding him to discuss his work or defend himself in the ensuing
six months -- during which his scientific reputation was trashed by a
fierce cadre of pro-biotech scientists in Britain and around the globe.
What had Pusztai done? With the prior approval of his boss, this world
authority on a class of plant compounds called lectins had made the case
for food safety testing for all genetically engineered crops. At the time,
Pusztai's team was conducting the only independent scientific research in
the world designed to test the safety of genetically engineered foods.
Originally an enthusiastic supporter of genetic engineering, Pusztai had
not expected to find any negative results. So Pusztai was both surprised
and alarmed to find that rats fed potatoes genetically engineered with a
specific lectin developed disturbing changes in the size and weight of some
of their vital organs. He also found evidence of weakened immune systems. A
control group of rats fed ordinary potatoes and another fed spuds with the
lectin added but not genetically spliced in showed no such results.
When the interviewer asked if the lack of safety testing for genetically
engineered foods concerned Pusztai, he said it did. When asked if he would
eat his own genetically engineered potatoes, Pusztai said he would not, and
that he didn't think it was fair to use people as guinea pigs for an
untested new technology.

Pusztai's remarks helped galvanize a growing consumer revolt in Europe that
has cost the biotech industry dearly. Opposition to genetically engineered
foods is now strong there and in many other parts of the world as well. In
response, a well-funded and -organized biotech hype machine has emerged to
promote biotech food as the solution to world hunger and squelch concerns
about its safety. Groups like the U.S.-based Biotechnology Industry
Organization (BIO), the industry's main trade and lobbying group, are
desperately trying to prevent a similar consumer revolt from happening in
the United States. Through sponsorship of scientific research in the
nation's universities as well as high-powered lobbying on Capitol Hill, the
biotech promoters are doing their best to neutralize critics. Their
academic sponsorships channel research away from biotech's potential
negative effects, while their closed-door meetings in Washington ensure
that consumers don't get adequate food testing or labeling, and organic
farmers won't get the regulations they need to keep their crops free of
genetic contamination.

Few academics are willing to openly criticize biotechnology for fear of
retribution from the biotech boosters, say biotech skeptics like John
Ikerd, a retired agricultural economist from the University of Missouri. In
his view, the enormous public resources devoted to biotechnology programs
are corporate giveaways that come at the expense of other kinds of
research. His own work focused on sustainable agriculture systems for
smaller-scale family farms rather than serving the big agribusiness models
land-grant universities have been promoting for more than 50 years. Ikerd's
type of research is viewed as a threat to corporate agriculture, he says,
because it enables farmers to reduce their reliance on the fertilizers,
pesticides, and other products that agribusiness companies sell.
Ikerd's candor was not well received at his university. "You become labeled
as not a team player, as not one of the trusted members of the faculty," he
says. "You are not on committees you used to be on, you're not involved in
the leadership of the department, and you don't get write-ups in the
university publications. You have to decide before you speak out that you
don't care about these repercussions. It's like being a whistleblower."
A survey measuring attitudes toward biotechnology among Cornell University
agricultural and nutrition-science faculty and extension staff (who advise
farmers) found that nearly half have reservations about the health, safety,
and environmental impacts of genetically engineered food crops and doubt
they are the answer to global hunger. Strong biotech supporters numbered 37
percent, while 8 percent thought agricultural biotech might have useful
applications and help with global hunger but expressed concerns about food
safety issues in light of inadequate testing. Though their numbers were
fewer, the biotech promoters said they felt very comfortable publicly
voicing their views, while the concerned majority did not express that
sentiment.

Ann Clark, a pasture scientist at the University of Guelph in Canada, is
among those who have been chastised for expressing reservations. A little
over a year ago, she publicly criticized the lack of food safety testing
for transgenic crops. "Within two hours of the press conference releasing
the report, my dean had called me unethical," Clark said. "He said I was
paid to be a pasture scientist and that I should stick with that. It became
quite ugly, because the national media picked it up, and people whose views
aren't parallel to mine have used [the dean's remarks] extensively."
Clark has tenure, so she isn't worried about losing her job. But she says
her treatment has had a chilling effect on the debate about biotechnology
within Canadian universities. "There aren't many academics who will say
something if they know their administrators, the people who sit in judgment
on their performance, are going to publicly lambaste them," she said. That
initial incident has made Clark more determined than ever to raise
questions about biotechnology. Besides continuing to speak openly, she has
a number of papers on her website that discuss the growing dominance of
biotech in publicly funded universities and question the quality of the
science driving biotech's advancement.

Whether they work directly for biotech companies or receive corporate
grants for their work in universities or government research institutes,
scientists are generally forbidden to disclose their results because of
secrecy clauses in their contracts. Such clauses are likely to proliferate
as public support for research and education is replaced by corporate
moneya shift that is already well under way. Writing in the March 2000
issue of the Atlantic Monthly, Eyal Press and Jennifer Washburn report that
corporate funding of university research increased fivefold, from $850
million to $4.25 billion between 1985 and 1995. By 1997, corporate
contributions constituted 40 percent of the overall academic research
budget.

Sarah Bantz, a graduate student in agricultural economics at the University
of Missouri, is researching private money coming into her university over a
30-year period. To get access to corporate contracts, she had to promise
not to reveal any specifics about them. She says that of all the biotech
research undertaken at the University of Missouri, only one study is
assessing health, safety, or environmental impacts. "Virtually all the
research is for product development, one way or another," she says.
Traditionally, universities have been reservoirs of independent thinking
where tenured faculty had the academic freedom to analyze and interpret
science and its implications for society without pressure from financially
interested parties. But as funding ties between private industry and
universities grow, the pool of independent research is shrinking. "It would
be as if we had to draw our scientists from corporations every time we
wanted to convene a body of experts to help us resolve a technical,
scientific problem with public-policy implications in society," says Tufts
University professor Sheldon Krimsky, an authority on the social
implications of science and technology. "Corporations will have much more
direction and control over what technologies get introduced and what are
considered to be safe and unsafe."

Organic farmer David Vetter is facing off with the biotech boosters, too,
but they act as if he doesn't exist. Vetter's 280-acre Nebraska farm is a
patchwork of sweet corn, popcorn, soybeans, barley, a variety of grasses,
legumes, and grazing paddocks for cattle. Visitors, including Fred
Kirschenmann, director of the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at
Iowa State University, come away impressed by the care that goes into the
operation. "It strikes you when you step out on that farm," says
Kirschenmann. "You can see it in the fields. It's just good stewardship."
Vetter may be a good caretaker, but he can't control the wind.
Cross-fertilization between corn plants occurs regularly in the Corn Belt
as winds carry pollen from field to field. Prior to the first large-scale
commercial plantings of genetically engineered crops in 1996, wind
pollination did not pose particular problems for organic farmers. Their
biggest challenge was trying to keep pesticides from blowing onto their
fields. But with the advent of transgenic cropsa, nd growing public
disquiet, bolstered by some alarming preliminary data on the health and
environmental effects of such crops, farmers like Vetter face a real threat
to their livelihood. Vetter has been testing for transgenic contamination
since 1998. Last year, he found it.

Transgenic contamination is already widespread: 100 percent of the organic
corn samples sent in to be tested from the Midwest this year showed some
degree of genetic contamination, which could result in organic corn growers
losing their certification, and probably their markets.

So far, Vetter's customers say they will reluctantly accept a certain
amount of transgenic contamination, as long as it stays at very low levels.
But Vetter is worried. The loss of the organic market for his corn would
hit him hard its revenue equals the net profit his farm generates. In the
meantime, he's saddled with a hefty bill: It cost him $1,500 to test one
$4,000 load of corn for contamination. "It's extremely frustrating when you
have to pay those kinds of costs, through no fault of your own, because
somebody's introduced technology they can't manage," Vetter says.
Years ago, Vetter began planting double rows of pines, with 60 feet of
untilled sod in between, creating a buffer zone to protect his crops from
pesticides drifting over from neighboring farms. The buffer hasn't
prevented transgenic pollution, though, and this time he's adamant that
responsibility for his genetically contaminated crop should fall squarely
on both those who have introduced bioengineered corn into agriculture and
the government agencies that have allowed the widespread use of essentially
unregulated genetically engineered crops. "It's now clear that we won't be
able to have both genetically engineered and non-GE crops," Vetter says.
"As an organic grower, I can no longer guarantee that my crops are GE-free.
The only resolution I can see is a ban on biotech crops."

Michael Phillips, executive director for food and agriculture at the
Biotechnology Industry Organization, is trying to make sure that Vetter and
farmers like him don't get their way. Phillips and his staff see their task
as creating a barrier between biotech critics and Washington legislators,
while also working to educate decision-makers on what they claim to be
biotech's benefits. So far, BIO has been extremely successful in its
mission. Consumer-oriented biotech legislation, mandatory labeling of
genetically engineered ingredients on food packages, which independent
consumer polls consistently indicate the public wants, and a pre-market
safety approval process for biotech foods, has not gotten far on Capitol
Hill. Phillips has said that pre-market approval is "something the industry
would never support." He and his colleagues at BIO have also worked to
defeat the establishment of any tracking system that could require
transgenic seed purchases to be registered. Such registration could
establish liability for the kind of contamination that Vetter experienced.
Prior to joining BIO in 1999, Phillips was director of the National Academy
of Sciences Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources. When Phillips left
the academy for BIO, he was in the middle of directing a study to assess
the health and environmental safety of crops genetically engineered to
contain pesticides. The revolving door took him swiftly from a group that
provides policy-makers with independent scientific advice to one that
lobbies on behalf of chemical-intensive agriculture.

Because of the success of such advocacy, Congress has been reluctant to
regulate pesticides or promote organic farming and other alternatives to
chemical-intensive agriculture. But it does generously fund
biotechnology. The 2001 budget allocates $310 million for biotech in
agriculture and rural-development programs. Federal support for organic
farming is less than $5 million.

In agriculture and beyond, biotech has huge moneymaking potential. Harvard
Business School professor Ray A. Goldberg predicts the new genetic
technologies will revolutionize the global economy by turning traditionally
distinct industry sectors, agriculture, health care, energy, and computing
-- into one gargantuan life-science industry with "virtually unlimited
commercial [patent and ownership] possibilities." Asked to quantify the
value of future biotech markets, Goldberg says he had been thinking it
could reach $16 trillion. But then he changed his mind, saying that there
really isn't any way to put a number on future markets for "virtually
everything."

In autumn 1999, Phillips's organization held "Biotechnology School," weekly
or bi-weekly meetings between BIO staff and members of the House Committee
on Agriculture and their staffs. At these sessions, BIO taught its
congressional pupils what biotechnology is, how it's being used in food and
agriculture, and where the science is leading. According to one
congressional source who requested anonymity, BIO's school exemplified
"typical industry access" to Congress that citizen groups simply don't
have. "The agriculture committee is going to control the biotech debate in
Congress, and they basically said, 'Come on in BIO, here's everybody you
need to lobby. And you can do it every week or as much as you want,'" the
source said. "This offer is not extended to environmental or food-safety
groups, no way, no how."

BIO has also set up congressional biotechnology caucusesone in the House
and one in the Senatethat work with the industry to advance its issues.
Adam Kovacevich, a spokesperson for Cal Dooley, D-Calif., one of the four
co-chairs of the House Biotech Caucus, describes the 65-member group as a
"forum for advocacy" that "educates fellow members of Congress on the
positive implications of biotechnology." Two of the co-chairs, one
Republican and one Democrat, sit on the House Agriculture Committee, and
the two others, also one from each party, are on the House Commerce
Committee, which has jurisdiction over medical applications of
biotechnology.

Though the caucus is not promoting any particular bill, it alerts caucus
members to any legislative or regulatory activity that could affect
biotechnology. This activity clearly helps keep legislators in the biotech
camp. In the last session of Congress, a bill requiring labels on
genetically engineered foods was introduced by Representative Dennis
Kucinich, D-Ohio. Only one member of the biotech caucus, Mark Udall,
D-Colo., supported the ill-fated bill. Udall's district includes the
environmentally aware community of Boulder as well as an area with a lot of
biotech companies, says Jennifer Barrett, a legislative assistant in his
office. "He cosponsored the labeling bill because he's concerned that
consumers should have all the information they need about the food they are
eating," she says.

The caucus also organizes forums where invited experts brief members on
various biotech issues. Richard Caplan, who works on biotech issues for the
U.S. Public Interest Research Group, contacted Dooley's office, offering to
present his perspective on biotech food issues. His offer was ignored.
An aid to one of the leaders of the biotech caucus defended the group's
orientation. "We're primarily interested in getting out the facts and the
science," he said. "We're trying to make this a debate that's based not so
much on passion and assumptions but on the actual science." But without the
voices of researchers like Arpad Pusztai, farmers like David Vetter, and
public-interest advocates like Richard Caplan, one wonders whether it's a
debate at all or just nonstop communiqués from the biotech hype machine.