Sir Richard Roberts, Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine (1993), opened the press conference asking Greenpeace to reverse its stance on genetically engineered crops. Credit: Jenny Splitter
More than 100 Nobel Laureates are calling on Greenpeace to reconsider its opposition to GMOs. Yesterday, representatives of the group of Nobel Laureates, Sir Richard Roberts, Professor Martin Chalfie and Professor Randy Schekman held a press conference at the National Press Club to explain why 110 Nobel Laureates came together now to support transgenic crops and ask Greenpeace to reverse its long-held stance against GMOs.
Sir Richard Roberts, the scientist who organized the letter campaign, shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his team’s discovery of introns in genes. He opened the press conference with a brief explanation of “precision agriculture,” his preferred term for GMOs. Genetic modification of crops is nothing new, he noted, as for thousands of years farmers have used various techniques to select for desirable traits. “Everything is a GMO,” explained Roberts. Transgenic breeding is just more precise, and crucial for bringing nutritious food to the developing world. “Why wouldn’t you want this superior technology?” questioned Roberts.
Randy Schekman, who shared the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his team’s discovery of the machinery regulating vesicle traffic in cells, went on to describe the science behind golden rice, a transgenic crop enriched with beta-carotene. Golden rice was created by a non-profit with plans to distribute the rice for free in the developing world but, according to scientists, protests by Greenpeace have interfered with its development. Roberts accused Greenpeace of creating a culture of fear, and urged the environmental group to reverse its stance. Safety concerns about GMOs may have been prudent when the technology was first introduced, but now decades later it’s clear these concerns haven’t come to fruition. As Roberts quipped, “we’ve had forty years of GMOs now but Greenpeace is still living in the 80s.”
Nina Fedoroff said that campaigns against genetically engineered crops have resulted in attacks against scientists. Credit: Jenny Splitter
According to Martin Chalfie, who shared the 2008 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for discovering the important Green Fluorescent Protein widely used in research, Greenpeace’s objections to GMOs are an ever-moving target. First the organization complained golden rice had too little beta carotene, then apparently too much. These objections, according to Chalfie, aren’t based on science at all. Schekman added that he’s baffled by Greenpeace’s decision to embrace scientific consensus on climate change but reject it for GMOs.
In addition to preventing important developments in agriculture, these scientists also expressed concerns for their vocation. Some scientists are afraid to come forward, Roberts noted bluntly. “All of us who use genetic engineering in our work have been concerned,” agreed Chalfie. Nina Federoff, professor of plant biology, added that the US Right to Know’s FOIA campaign has had a severe impact on many public scientists, noting in particular the break-in to Professor Kevin Folta’s office at the University of Florida just a few days prior to this conference.
As I left the press conference, two men, one from Greenpeace and the other from Food and Water Watch, stopped each attendee as they left the room, protesting that they weren’t allowed in to the press conference. “Are you with the press?” they asked each person who filed past them. Both Greenpeace and FWW have argued that the golden rice project has problems that have nothing to do with the anti-GMO movement, citing a paper critical of the project.
Greenpeace activists protest Golden Rice at the Philippine Department of Agriculture in Manila in 2008. Credit: Greenpeace/Luis Liwanag
Accusations that anyone is blocking genetically engineered ‘Golden’ rice are false. ‘Golden’ rice has failed as a solution and isn’t currently available for sale, even after more than 20 years of research. As admitted by the International Rice Research Institute, it has not been proven to actually address Vitamin A Deficiency. So to be clear, we are talking about something that doesn’t even exist.
Adrian Dubock, former project manager for the Golden Rice project at the International Rice Research Institute, has now written a response defending the work.
Vitamin A deficiency (VAD) remains a killer in many parts of the developing world. And rice feeds half the world every day. Rice has to be polished for storage or it goes rancid, and polished rice contains no pro-vitamin A. There is no new data on the mortality reducing impact of providing a source of vitamin A to those that need it, as the positive effects are so clear in a research context that to withhold it would be unethical. And only Random Controlled Trials can and have isolated the one cause which relates to mortality: such data have demonstrated the 23 – 34% of global under 5 years child mortality can be prevented by an accessible source of vitamin A.
Many wonder why Greenpeace and others oppose the Golden Rice project so vociferously when its goals are free and life-saving food. As Washington Post columnist Tamar Haspel tweeted — “Here’s the thing about Golden Rice. Don’t you want it to succeed?”
The text of the letter is below.
To the Leaders of Greenpeace, the United Nations and Governments around the world
The United Nations Food & Agriculture Program has noted that global production of food, feed and fiber will need approximately to double by 2050 to meet the demands of a growing global population. Organizations opposed to modern plant breeding, with Greenpeace at their lead, have repeatedly denied these facts and opposed biotechnological innovations in agriculture. They have misrepresented their risks, benefits, and impacts, and supported the criminal destruction of approved field trials and research projects.
We urge Greenpeace and its supporters to re-examine the experience of farmers and consumers worldwide with crops and foods improved through biotechnology, recognize the findings of authoritative scientific bodies and regulatory agencies, and abandon their campaign against “GMOs” in general and Golden Rice in particular.
Scientific and regulatory agencies around the world have repeatedly and consistently found crops and foods improved through biotechnology to be as safe as, if not safer than those derived from any other method of production. There has never been a single confirmed case of a negative health outcome for humans or animals from their consumption. Their environmental impacts have been shown repeatedly to be less damaging to the environment, and a boon to global biodiversity.
Greenpeace has spearheaded opposition to Golden Rice, which has the potential to reduce or eliminate much of the death and disease caused by a vitamin A deficiency (VAD), which has the greatest impact on the poorest people in Africa and Southeast Asia.
The World Health Organization estimates that 250 million people, suffer from VAD, including 40 percent of the children under five in the developing world. Based on UNICEF statistics, a total of one to two million preventable deaths occur annually as a result of VAD, because it compromises the immune system, putting babies and children at great risk. VAD itself is the leading cause of childhood blindness globally affecting 250,000 – 500,000 children each year. Half die within 12 months of losing their eyesight.
WE CALL UPON GREENPEACE to cease and desist in its campaign against Golden Rice specifically, and crops and foods improved through biotechnology in general;
WE CALL UPON GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD to reject Greenpeace’s campaign against Golden Rice specifically, and crops and foods improved through biotechnology in general; and to do everything in their power to oppose Greenpeace’s actions and accelerate the access of farmers to all the tools of modern biology, especially seeds improved through biotechnology. Opposition based on emotion and dogma contradicted by data must be stopped.
How many poor people in the world must die before we consider this a “crime against humanity”?
Sincerely,
Zhores I. Alferov
2000
Physics
Sidney Altman
1989
Chemistry
Hiroshi Amano
2014
Physics
Werner Arber
1978
Medicine
Richard Axel
2004
Medicine
David Baltimore
1975
Medicine
Paul Berg
1980
Chemistry
Bruce A. Beutler
2011
Medicine
Elizabeth H. Blackburn
2009
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Gunter Blobel
1999
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Paul D. Boyer
1997
Chemistry
Sydney Brenner
2002
Medicine
Mario R. Capecchi
2007
Medicine
Thomas R. Cech
1989
Chemistry
Martin Chalfie
2008
Chemistry
Steven Chu
1997
Physics
Aaron Ciechanover
2004
Chemistry
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji
1997
Physics
Leon N. Cooper
1972
Physics
Elias James Corey
1990
Chemistry
Robert F. Curl Jr.
1996
Chemistry
Johann Deisenhofer
1988
Chemistry
Peter C. Doherty
1996
Medicine
Richard R. Ernst
1991
Chemistry
Sir Martin J. Evans
2007
Medicine
Eugene F. Fama
2013
Economics
Edmond H. Fischer
1992
Medicine
Jerome I. Friedman
1990
Physics
Andre Geim
2010
Physics
Ivar Giaever
1973
Physics
Walter Gilbert
1980
Chemistry
Alfred G. Gilman
1994
Medicine
Sheldon Glashow
1979
Physics
Roy J. Glauber
2005
Physics
Joseph L. Goldstein
1985
Medicine
David J. Gross
2004
Physics
Roger Guillemin
1977
Medicine
Sir John B. Gurdon
2012
Medicine
John L. Hall
2005
Physics
Lars Peter Hansen
2013
Economics
Serge Haroche
2012
Physics
Leland H. Hartwell
2001
Medicine
Harald zur Hausen
2008
Medicine
James J. Heckman
2000
Economics
Dudley R. Herschbach
1986
Chemistry
Avram Hershko
2004
Chemistry
Gerardus ‘t Hooft
1999
Physics
H. Robert Horvitz
2002
Medicine
Robert Huber
1988
Chemistry
Tim Hunt
2001
Medicine
Louis J. Ignarro
1998
Medicine
Elfriede Jelinek
2004
Literature
Daniel Kahneman
2002
Economics
Eric R. Kandel
2000
Medicine
Wolfgang Ketterle
2001
Physics
Aaron Klug
1982
Chemistry
Brian K. Kobilka
2012
Chemistry
Roger D. Kornberg
2006
Chemistry
Herbert Kroemer
2000
Physics
Finn E. Kydland
2004
Economics
Leon M. Lederman
1988
Physics
Yuan T. Lee
1986
Chemistry
Robert J. Lefkowitz
2012
Chemistry
Anthony J. Leggett
2003
Physics
Jean-Marie Lehn
1987
Chemistry
Michael Levitt
2013
Chemistry
Tomas Lindahl
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Chemistry
Rudolph A. Marcus
1992
Chemistry
Barry J. Marshall
2005
Medicine
Eric S. Maskin
2007
Economics
John C. Mather
2006
Physics
Craig C. Mello
2006
Medicine
Robert C. Merton
1997
Economics
Hartmut Michel
1988
Chemistry
James A. Mirrlees
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Economics
Paul L. Modrich
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Chemistry
William E. Moerner
2014
Chemistry
Mario J. Molina
1995
Chemistry
Edvard Moser
2014
Medicine
May-Britt Moser
2014
Medicine
Kary B. Mullis
1993
Chemistry
Ferid Murad
1998
Medicine
Erwin Neher
1991
Medicine
Ryoji Noyori
2001
Chemistry
Sir Paul Nurse
2001
Medicine
Christiane Nusslein-Volhard
1995
Medicine
Arno Penzias
1978
Physics
Stanley B. Prusiner
1997
Medicine
Jose Ramos-Horta
1996
Peace
Sir Richard J. Roberts
1993
Medicine
Bert Sakmann
1991
Medicine
Bengt I. Samuelsson
1982
Medicine
Randy W. Schekman
2013
Medicine
Brian P. Schmidt
2011
Physics
Richard R. Schrock
2005
Chemistry
Phillip A. Sharp
1993
Medicine
Hamilton O. Smith
1978
Medicine
Oliver Smithies
2007
Medicine
Thomas A. Steitz
2009
Chemistry
Joseph H. Taylor Jr.
1993
Physics
Daniel C. Tsui
1998
Physics
Harold E. Varmus
1989
Medicine
Sir John E. Walker
1997
Chemistry
J. Robin Warren
2005
Medicine
Arieh Warshel
2013
Chemistry
James Watson
1962
Medicine
Eric F. Wieschaus
1995
Medicine
Frank Wilczek
2004
Physics
Robert Woodrow Wilson
1978
Physics
Ada E. Yonath
2009
Chemistry
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