PHA-Exchange> Re: GM Rice in Bangladesh

Tue Feb 1 21:55:35 PST 2005

Farmers are not 'day-blind': They can see the harmful effects of Golden Rice

Farida Akhter & Farhad Mazhar

The BBC Bangla news on 18 January, 2005 (as well as found in BBC website
titled "Bangladesh 'endorses' GM rice") reported on the possible allowing of
research of GM rice in the country. This news came as a shock to the
environmental activists who have been resisting the introduction of GMOs. It
was also a puzzle to those who have been debating on the GMO issues on
scientific grounds including bio-safety and other regulatory matters.
Bangladesh does not have the capacity to contain GMOs and legal and
regulatory regimes are absent to deal with transgenic products. The decision
of the Ministry of Agriculture amounts to knowingly polluting biodiversity
of Bangladesh, particularly agrobiodiversity and opening the door for the
destruction of biodiversity-based farming systems of Bangladesh.
Biodiversity-based production system of Bangladesh is unique both
historically and scientifically and recent interests in the private sectors
to market ecologically produced safe food clearly demonstrates tremendous
economic potential for organic and ecological product both domestically and
internationally. In that case introduction of GMO rice is a clear economic
threat to this nascent sector as well. Geographically Bangladesh belongs to
the origin of diversity areas of the world. Government failed to clarify the
reasons to take such decision of endorsing GMOs that poses threat to human
health, environment and to the farming communities. The genetically
engineered rice variety that is going to be introduced has for long been
criticised by scientists, farmers and activist as a gimmick and have no
agronomic value[1]. 

According to the BBC report the Ministry of Agriculture of government of
Bangladesh says it hopes to release a type of genetically modified rice to
farmers if on-going research is successful. The Authorities claim "the new
rice may help feed Bangladesh's growing population as well as tackle certain
common ailments associated with malnutrition". The chief of the Bangladesh
Rice Research Institute, Dr Mahidul Haque, said a locally developed rice
variety known as BRRI 29 has been transformed into a genetically modified
rice.

He said beta carotene - which the body develops into Vitamin A - had been
taken from daffodils and added to the rice. This made it useful in fighting
conditions such as poor sight and blindness.

The Agriculture Minister Mr. M K Anwar says the government does not object
to GM technology, which may prove beneficial. Research into the crop is
being carried out at the Bangladesh Rice Research Institute. However, he
acknowledged that GM foods are controversial worldwide, but his government
will not take any stand against the technology.

"We'll introduce GM rice in Bangladesh after proper testing and going
through the national and international rules and regulations," he told the
BBC. Officials expect the research on GM rice to be completed shortly, but
no time-frame has been given. 

The BBC also reported that the environmentalists and health experts have
already warned the government against introducing any GM rice and food in
Bangladesh without testing. They fear that any GM food without proper
testing could create severe health problems in a poor country like
Bangladesh.

In Bangladesh the introduction of GM rice has couple of strategic corporate
interest. First is to ensure the entry of GMOs in the rice cultures of Asia.
Secondly, it aims to enhance the profile of GMO in general in the face of
the protests in the North, by introducing it in a country well known for its
wealth in biodiversity. Thirdly, it is also integral part of the overall
strategy of destroying the existing seed systems of sharing and exchange of
seed by the farming communities. The patents that are associated with the
proposed seed variety will create condition for the market of patented rice
varieties. All these moves are inimical to the farming communities that
constitutes majority of the Bangladeshi people.

The move is also clearly against the farming communities of Bangladesh who
demonstrated, without any government support that biodiversity-based
ecological agriculture is more productive, and there are enough local
varieties that could produce more than 6 tons per hectare, if eco-systemic
approach is undertaken and historical knowledge of farmers of this Gangetic
delta is taken into account to manage the farming systems. Researchers, who
favour modern varieties with genuine concerns for increased food production,
also did find in the comparative studies that ecological farming is at least
equal in productivity compared to modern varieties[2], therefore making no
sense in taking environmental and ecological risks where other methods of
cultivation is already proved successful, and widely accepted in any part of
Bangladesh. There are many villages and unions known as ecological villages
in Bangladesh. 

Inspired by their own research, farmers of Nayakrishi Andolon, the New
Agricultural Movement, cultivated 1561 varieties of rice in the past Aman
season in the year 2004. They altogether cultivated nearly 2000 varieties of
rice and many of those varieties, particularly red and semi-red rice is very
rich in nutrition, in addition to the higher return of productivity. Despite
the documentation available and the research data placed in the national
seminars in presence of the scientists and policy makers, government did not
undertake any collaborative research with the ecological farmers to
disseminate the techniques of enhanced rice production by the ecological
farmers, instead, introducing GMO rice. It is important to note that except
Nayakrishi Andolon, there is no systematic study on the productivity of the
local varieties, and the farmer's seed systems. The decision of the
government shows that it lacks scientific objectivity and intentionally
remaining blind to the available research and analysis. It is clearly
manipulated by the Corporations eager to introduce GMOs in Bangladesh. There
is absolutely no need of introducing a genetically modified rice seed which
will only pollute the environment and will not solve the problem of food
availability.

We know through various international and regional networks such as
Institute of Science in Society (ISIS), Grain, Third World Network, SANFEC
that rice has become a very attractive business interest for the
corporations. According to ISIS, several major transnational seed
corporations - Aventis, Dupont, Monsanto, Syngenta - now have rice
programmes[3]. Rice is self-pollinated, making hybrid rice seed production
costly and difficult, and nearly all rice in Asia is still grown with
farmer-saved seed. The seed industry believes that the combination of
genetic engineering and patents can overcome this hurdle. "Through patents
and contractual agreements, seed companies will seek to prohibit farmers
from sharing or saving seed, control what pesticides are used and even
assert ownership rights over the harvest."

Golden rice is produced by splicing three foreign genes - two from the
daffodil and one from a bacterium - into japonica rice, a variety adapted
for temperate climates. The developers anticipate at least five more years
will be required to breed the Vitamin A trait into rice varieties adapted to
local climates in developing countries. The experts believe that such
anticipation is overly optimistic, given the unprecedented difficulties
presented by engineering a complex three-gene trait (all current GE crops
are spliced with single-gene constructs), and the need for safety and
environmental testing before field introduction.

The main argument that Golden Rice is needed in a country like Bangladesh is
totally baseless. Greenpeace calculated, based on the product developers'
own figures that an adult would have to eat at least 12 times the normal
intake of 300 g rice to get the daily recommended amount of pro-vitamin A.
An adult would have to eat at least 3.7 kg dry weight of rice, i.e. around 9
kg of cooked rice, to satisfy their daily need of vitamin A from Golden
rice. In other words, a normal daily intake of 300 g of rice would at best
provide 8% of the vitamin A needed daily. A breast feeding woman would have
to eat at least 6.3 kg in dry weight, converting to nearly 18 kg of cooked
rice per day. Whereas, a poor family in a village cooks only 2 kg of rice
for four persons for two/three meals a day. Why should they spend extra
money to cook nearly 4 kg of golden rice per person? Also people do not eat
rice only, they have to eat vegetables, fish etc. with rice.  Isn't it an
expensive proposition for the Bangladeshi poors? Therefore it is clear that,
the Ministry of Agriculture is not helping the poor but only helping the
multinational companies. 

Already the governments since sixties of the last century have caused
enormous loss of diverse crops that the Bangladeshi people grew in the
country. Through green revolution monoculture crops of rice and wheat were
introduced resulting in decrease in pulses, oil seeds, and through the use
of pesticides there was a steep decline in fish production. So the
nutritional deficiencies were not caused by lack of necessary food crops,
but because of introduction of technologies in monoculture rice production.
The decline in soil fertility has also resulted in the decline in
productivity with increasing costs of production. After the failure of high
yielding variety rice to meet the problem of hunger, the government
introduced Hybrid rice in the late eighties and nineties with the promises
of higher yields. Even those were not successful. On the other hand, the
increased use of pesticides, herbicides and chemical fertilisers caused
further deterioration of environment, particularly loss of many green, leafy
vegetables that had been important sources of Vitamin A. It is a well
recognised fact in Bangladesh even documented by national institutes of
nutrition that many leafy green known as saks, vegetables and fruits can
supplement vitamin A in food. The Institute of Food and Nutrition in
Bangladesh listed leafy greens, vegetables and fruits with different
nutrients, such as iron, sugar, calcium, carotene, vit. B1, vit-B2, vit. -C
etc. It showed that rice husked in mills do not contain carotene, but rice
husked in wooden dheki contains carotene. The carotene content of various
widely available saks are very high. These are Katanotey(Amaranthus
spinosus), kochu sak (Calocasia Arum), sajna pata (Moringa Obifera), pudina
pata (Menthea piperita), khesari sak, kolmi sak (Ipomoea aquatica), sweet
potato leaves (Ipomoea batatas), thankuni( Hydrocotyle Asiatica) palong
(spinach), raddish leaves and many others. Most of these greens are not even
cultivated. They grow as partners to mixed cultivated crops or as
uncultivated plants on the road side, open fields etc. There are many
vegetables which contain carotene. They are carrot, sweet gourd, red bean,
banana shoot, green chili, bitter gourd, okra, egg plant, amaranthus, union
buds, pulse etc. The fruits are ripe mango, ripe papaya, pineapple, ripe
fig, yellow melons etc. With such wide variety of possibilities for vitamin
A sources, why does Bangladesh need Golden rice to prevent and cure night
blindness? 

There is a worldwide resistance against field testing of GM crops because GM
pollen and seeds contaminate normal crops. For example, in 2000, nearly
25,000 acres of European rapeseed (canola) and maize were discovered to be
contaminated with unapproved GM varieties. There are many other examples of
contaminations. In terms of health, according to Plant Journal 27(6) in the
article on Assessment the food safety issues related to genetically modified
crops, " all GM crops are subject to potentially hazardous unintended
effects that are impossible to predict and extremely difficult to test for.
However, according to the USDA database of GM crop field trials, some of
these crops are intended to produce substances that raise human health
concerns such as allergenicity, nutritional deficits etc. Tomatoes,
potatoes, rice, grapes, wheat and barley have been engineered to produce
anti-fungal compounds from the class of pathogenesis-related (PR) proteins,
which is "widely regarded as a rich source of allergens." An expert in this
field warns that such GM plants could cause food allergies. Corn and
soybeans are being genetically manipulated for radical alterations in oil,
protein and starch content for use as animal feed in factory-farm livestock
operations.

The farmers in Bangladesh have seen the effects of Green Revolution in which
HYV seeds were used along with chemical fertilizers, pesticides, ground
water for irrigation, they are experiencing the harmful effects of hybrid
seeds. The new technologies have always promised them with more
productivity, but those promises were never fulfilled. The scientists never
felt the responsibility to admit publicly that they were wrong in proposing
those technologies. Although they do admit in scientific papers. By
believing in the false promises the farmers have already lost thousands of
varieties rice, they needed as staple food, for specific nutritional needs,
cultural, religious, spiritual needs. So new promises would not work,
particularly the technologies which are already controversial, and which
have the potential effects on farmers seed saving. Farmers are not blind,
they cannot be fooled with promises of curing or preventing night blindness
with the so called Vit. A rice or the Golden Rice. If the rice which is
supposed to cure a disease and at the same time is responsible for other
health hazards, environmental pollution and loss of control over seeds by
farmers, is itself contradictory and therefore cannot be acceptable.   

  _____  

[1] See Grains of delusion: Golden rice seen from the ground, a GRAIN
Briefing, by Biothai (Thailand), CEDAC (Cambodia), DRCSC (India), GRAIN,
MASIPAG (Philippines), PAN-Indonesia and UBINIG (Bangladesh)
http://www.grain.org/briefings/?id=18 ;  "Mirage" of GM's Golden promise, by
Alex Kirby, BBC News Online environment correspondent, February 2004.
http://www.biotech-info.net/mirage_of_promise.html; "Genetically Engineered
'Golden Rice' is Fool's Gold" Greenpeace Statement, February 9, 2001 

[2] Golam Rasul and Gopal B. Thapa, Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand;
Sustainability Analysis of Ecological and Conventional Agricultural Systems
in Bangladesh; World Development Vol.31. No. 10 pp1721-1741.2003

[3] see "Rice War" http://www.i-sis.org.uk/

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