ProBiotech

In Biotech, The European Tail Must Not Wag The American Dog

Interference from Europe's hypochondriacs threatens to cut short agricultural progress before consumers can enjoy its benefits

I have just returned from St. Louis, Missouri, the American hub for many new developments in biotechnology. I talked there with farmers from Missouri and Illinois, with relevant agricultural councils and associations, Mississippi port authorities, government agencies and major biotechnology companies.

Throughout, the evidence was of exciting opportunities being developed with care and attention for both human nutrition and the environment. The story was one of high morality for human development throughout the world.

A few days before my own visit, four extreme British environmentalists had also descended on the city in an attempt to spread to America the current European hypochondria about this technology. They must not be allowed to succeed. The European tail of neurotic concern based on unfounded fears whipped up by a compliant press cannot be permitted to prevent this adaptive dog from barking.

First, most Europeans have no idea of the wonderful products that will be coming onto the market during the next 10 years or so. To date, biotechnology has been primarily of value for the producer and for the environment, particularly in cutting down both the amount and the number of chemical sprays that the farmer must use on fields. As the recently released report of the highly respected National Academy of Sciences stressed, there is evidence that the spread of Bt corn (named after the bacterium that has been engineered into the plant) may even increase biodiversity on farms.

But the real benefits of the technology will only be fully grasped when consumer-orientated products start to appear on supermarket shelves. These will include, for example, soy products with improved flavor, digestibility and obvious gains for healthy eating, including a reduction in the cholesterol levels of consumers. There will be novel oils, soy milks, and soy flours with beverage, food, meat and industrial benefits, possessing reduced anti-nutritional compounds and refined proteins and oils, such as high oleic soybean with 30 percent less saturated fat and zero ''trans'' fats. Soybean margarine will also become a possibility, with the combination of high stearic beans and high oleic beans.

And these benefits will not be confined to the rich consumers of North America and Europe. Already new biotech rices are under development with improved characteristics (taken from daffodils) in beta-carotene (and thus in Vitamin A) that will help more than 250 million people to a better and a healthier life. How dare Luddite European protesters put su ch opportunities at risk?

Secondly, Europeans have no idea of the heavy costs that their self-indulgent insistence on regulation after regulation, from increased testing to the ''identity preservation'' of crops, is heaping on farmers and on the industry as a whole. I wonder if they will be willing to pay for their whims?

Corn prices are kept low because of their bulk transport. Identity preservation of non-biotech from biotech crops will involve new stores, new elevators, new barges, new ships and the constant, labor-intensive cleaning of every piece of equipment employed. And for what purpose? To appease a European hysteria founded on little science and many wild myths.

Lastly, Europeans have no knowledge of the strong regulatory systems that exist in the United States. Of course such systems can always be improved, as recently recommended by the National Academy of Sciences, but, in the main, Americans are rightly proud of their history of novel crop and food testing. Safety to grow is assessed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture; safety for environmental release by the Environmental Protection Agency; and safety for human consumption by the highly effective Food and Drug Administration.

By contrast, in the European Union, there are no less than 29 different bodies involved and, in consequence, enormous delays and repetition in bringing any novel food to acceptance. There is also a strong suspicion that some of these delays are deliberate and distinct ly anti-competitive in character.

Is it any wonder, therefore, that many farmers, scientists and government officials in the United States are increasingly angry and deeply frustrated by the arrogant rejection of biotechnology by Europeans who have been unduly influenced by a small range of extreme environmentalists and proselytizing newspapers? Of course, we must always proceed with caution, but we must never lose sight of the exciting prospects that this technology offers.

I, therefore, beg America to be on its guard against cross-fertilization by European hypochondria; it is the one piece of genetic modification that we do not require. There is also an increasing need to sell the direct benefits of biotechnology to the consumer. In the past some important companies have not helped in this process and I am a little surprised to have to stress that good PR is everything.

This is a war we cannot afford to lose. The dog must again take control of the wagging tail.

The author, Philip Stott, is professor of biogeography at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, and editor of the Journal of Biogeography (Blackwell Science). He has just been on a biotechnology tour of Washington and St Louis as a ''voluntary visitor'' under a program organized by the Bureau of Public Diplomacy of the U.S. Department of State. This article first appeared in Bridge News.