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A Biotech Crop Risk Is Downgraded

Genetically engineered crops pose little risk to monarch butterflies and may even benefit the insects, scientists were cited as saying Wednesday.

At an informal conference Wednesday afternoon, researchers studying the effect of biotech corn pollen on the monarch discussed data collected last summer in a wide-reaching series of experiments. The story says that the conference was part of the joint annual meeting of the Entomological Society of America, the Entomological Society of Canada and the Quebec Society of Entomology.

Richard Hellmich, an entomologist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's research service at Iowa State University in Ames, was quoted as saying, "We never said there was no impact, but the question becomes, 'Is it substantial?' It appears that it's not and may even be close to zero." The story says that in 10 presentations, scientists from the United States and Canada detailed their efforts to determine whether young monarch caterpillars are likely to be in cornfields when the corn is shedding pollen and whether that pollen could poison them.

Researchers demonstrated that two types of corn pollen carrying low levels of Bt toxin - including a product engineered by Monsanto - had no significant effect on monarch caterpillars in the lab or in field trials. The result contradicts the Cornell study and one published this summer by Iowa State University researchers. Technical differences could account for the discrepancy, the scientists said.

One of the most surprising findings of the 18-month series of studies funded by the Agriculture Department and the biotechnology industry is that monarchs seem to prefer to lay eggs on milkweed plants inside Midwestern cornfields. Scientists previously thought that monarchs would rather visit milkweeds along roadsides and other natural areas.

The scientists estimated that 5 percent to 10 percent of the monarch population could be exposed to pollen from Bt corn. But the percentage of caterpillars negatively affected by the pollen is likely to be "very, very small," said John Pleasants of Iowa State University.

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