Food Biotechnology
Whose values, whose decisions?
by Marion Nestle

My training is in molecular biology and perhaps for that reason I spend much of my time explaining food biotechnology to the public, and public perceptions of food biotechnology to scientists. On a superficial level, public perceptions are easy to explain. Surveys of consumer attitudes about food biotechnology date back to the mid-1980s; I have copies of the results of more than 20 such surveys, at least five from 2000. Some academics have constructed careers by asking people what they think about the topic, but I do not find the survey results very interesting. For one thing, the surveys all produce similar results. They report that, in theory, people believe that biotechnology can do good things for them and the world, but:

• They don't understand the science,
• They are afraid of science and biotechnology,
• They don't trust the industry, and
• They don't trust government regulators.

I do not view these results as surprising or inconsistent. The surveys are superficial because they do not address the underlying problem -- that of Two Cultures. In his famous lecture on Two Cultures, C.P. Snow was referring to scientists versus humanists. He described "the gulf of mutual incomprehension" that separates people who think like scientists from people who don't, but with respect to food biotechnology, the gulf of mutual incomprehension seems especially wide.

When scientists talk about food biotechnology, they mention technical problems, safety and far-off visions of what the technology can do for the world's food supply. So do food biotechnology companies. This rhetoric is usually expressed as: "Biotechnology -- and only biotechnology -- can help the world produce the food necessary to meet the population needs of the 21st century."

Reality measured against rhetoric

The rhetoric raises two sets of issues other than safety, although both sets bear on it.

The first set of issues has to do with the reality as opposed to the rhetoric: what the industry actually produces and who actually benefits. Food biotechnology in the U.S. began with Bovine Somatotropin, Bt Corn, and Roundup Ready soybeans, all of which have agronomic traits that provide demonstrable benefits for growers. Next, the industry produced foods with processing traits. The tomato with the reversed gene for ripening is the best example of such foods. Such traits produce demonstrable benefits for processors.

Only now is the industry beginning to develop foods with quality attributes such as improved nutrient content that might produce some benefit for consumers. The "poster child" for quality attributes is the Golden Rice enriched with beta-carotene that has received so much favorable publicity. It's been created, but is not yet on the market. I will have more to say about this rice shortly. At the moment, the public does not have much to gain from the genetically engineered foods that are available -- not in price, not in nutritional benefit, and not in convenience -- nor are people generally aware of evidence for benefits to the environment or to people in developing countries. The "utility" issue fully explains why people did not protest recombinant insulin and other drugs or cheese enzymes -- most were demonstrably superior in quality and price to the products previously available.

Science: only one value system among many

The second kind of issue has to do with what I consider to be belief systems or ethical systems. Most non-scientists of my acquaintance view science as only one of a number of value or ethical systems, any one of which might have equal if not greater validity, worth and importance. I can identify at least seven (somewhat overlapping) categories of such systems related to food biotechnology -- not necessarily in order of importance.

1. Animal rights -- This is a belief system that views as wrong such actions as injecting recombinant bovine somatotropin into cows in order to force them to make more milk.

2. Religion -- This belief system is the one that led Prince Charles to say that he thought bioengineered foods took "mankind into realms that belong to God, and to God alone."

3. Morality -- This category explains why people are concerned about the insertion of animal genes into plants, flounder genes into strawberries, and genes for human antithrombin into goats. The people I talk to cannot always justify why such actions do not feel right to them, but they clearly do not.

4. Natural laws -- This category is analogous to religious values but it is secular; food biotechnology in some way violates the laws of nature. Questions about biodiversity, monoculture, and the monarch butterfly derive from this value system.

5. Social values -- This belief system encompasses concerns about the effects of corporate agriculture on rural America, not only the effects of pollution on the environment, but also the emptying out of small towns as farm labor becomes more mechanized -- the role of agriculture in American society.

6. Economic values -- This value system views the effects of corporate agriculture from an economic standpoint and encompasses concerns about the the accelerating loss of small farms and small businesses throughout rural America.

Last, but certainly not least, is:

7. Globalization -- This category reflects concerns about control of the food supply by faceless and unaccountable multinational corporations and is the one that led to protests against the World Trade Association in Seattle and against biotechnology companies in Boston.

All of these categories reflect the overriding feeling that food biotechnology corporations control decisions that are not necessarily in the public interest. Note that none refers directly to human or environmental safety. When people do talk about safety issues, I think that they really mean them as proxies for one or another of the seven value systems I have just mentioned; people talk about safety because they have to. Scientists, federal regulators and -- most of all -- the biotechnology companies have dismissed value and ethical considerations out of hand and simply will not permit them to be discussed. Safety is the only issue that scientists, government officials and industry will permit for debate.

Safety issues -- and rage

I saw this exclusion of other considerations during the time Joan Gussow and I served on the FDA Food Advisory Committee. In discussing whether or not the FDA should approve use of cow growth hormone, our committee was prohibited from considering anything other than human safety issues. Effects of the hormone on cows or on small dairy farms were irrelevant to the FDA's mandate and were excluded from the debate.

In my view, the narrowing of the discussion to safety issues has had two distinct effects. The first is to induce rage. I see people become furious when scientists tell them that science is truth, the products are safe, and nothing else matters. And scientists -- particularly those working for biotech companies -- make such assertions all the time. I have heard the head of one leading food biotechnology company say, "All we have to do to gain public support for food biotechnology is to educate the public that our products are safe." Such statements are shocking even to the heads of competing biotechnology companies. As I heard one of them say, "If I had your job, I'd resign."

People may not understand science very well, but everyone knows when they are being disrespected. Public response to assurances of safety is one of profound disbelief. And why shouldn't it be? People feel as though they are being experimented on, and they don't trust the experimenters -- or their defenders -- to be acting in the public interest.

The second effect of restricting the argument to food safety has been to focus attention on safety issues. People say: "Okay. You don't want to hear my concerns about animal rights, God's will and globalization? You only want to talk about safety? Fine. We'll talk safety. Let's talk about unintended consequences (witness tryptophan supplements), toxins, allergies, superweeds, Bt resistance, antibiotic resistance and -- oh yes -- monarch butterflies." Not one of these issues might make a scientist nervous -- all are probable, but remote -- but they contain just enough of a grain of truth to fuel debate and to discredit the credibility of any scientist or regulator who dismisses such concerns out of hand.

The passion that underlies the debates about safety, in my view, derives from the lack of opportunity to discuss the value and ethical implications of food biotechnology in a situation in which 50 percent of American soybeans and 35 percent of American corn grown last year was genetically modified. The public wants to talk about what those enormous percentages mean for them as individuals and a society. If all of this reminds scientists of arguments over nuclear power and irradiation, it should; the issues are quite similar and have to do mainly with who gets to make the decisions.

A basis for dialogue?

So, what is to be done? I think it's too late for easy solutions, but I do have some suggestions for steps that might help establish a basis for dialogue.

The industry needs to bring the rhetoric in line with reality and start producing useful products. I am not convinced that the beta-carotene rice is the best example -- there are too many concerns about its cost, cultural acceptability, and bioavailability, let alone those related to the unbalanced use of beta-carotene itself. To explain: Beta-carotene is a precursor of vitamin A, not the vitamin itself; it must be split into two equal parts to be active. This requires an enzyme which, in turn, requires adequate protein in the diet. It also must be absorbed; both the vitamin and its precursor are fat-soluble, meaning that they require fat from the diet to be absorbed. Absorption also requires an intact, functioning digestive tract which also requires a diet adequate in calories and essential nutrients. Thus, it is not enough just to supply beta-carotene because its use requires a generally adequate diet, a clean water supply (so the digestive tract does not become infected), and money to buy the rice -- all in short supply in countries where vitamin A is most deficient.

The industry must label its products. I've been on record since 1992 as saying that I think the companies were making a big mistake -- what others have called collosal stupidity -- when they opposed labeling. They are now paying the price in public suspicion, as are the regulatory agencies that went along with them. That is why the FDA is now playing "catch-up" and attempting to implement a voluntary labeling system. I say "catch-up" because we already have GM labeling: The supermarkets already sell products labeled "no-GMO" and "GM-free" and more are coming out all the time. Disclosure is a necessary first step in reassuring people that the industry isn't trying to hide something. Furthermore, the industry's argument that we should only label products, not processes, simply doesn't hold. The FDA permits process labeling -- for example, irradiated, previously frozen, made from concentrate, and organic. All set a precedent for process disclosure.

My last is for scientists: I think scientists need to learn how to talk about science to the public. If scientists can't explain the technology in ways that anyone can grasp, they cannot expect people to believe a word they say.

It is critically important that scientists understand that not everyone values hypothesis-driven investigations and that many other values influence public views of biotechnology. Until people feel as though they have some control over what they eat, they are unlikely to respect the industry. The industry needs to respect such views as a basis for bridging the gulf between the Two Cultures and opening up avenues for more constructive debate.

Marion Nestle is professor and chair of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at New York University. She presented this piece in a workshop at the January 2001 conference on Genetic Engineering and Food for the World sponsored by the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine and the Episcopal Church's Faith Ethics, Science and Technology Committee.