Paris 2002 - GMO : A typical case in welcome of an innovation

Académie d'Agriculture de France

Special session, Friday October 18th, 2002 :

Reconciling Science and Society in agriculture

André CAUDERON,, former AAF secretary
Summary

Comforted by all kinds of biotechnologies, transgenesis opens breathtaking alleys to plant breeding, whatever the problem at hand: designing salt or drought tolerant varieties, or improving resistance to parasites and predators, or enhancing qualities such as nutritional value, or simplifying cultivation methods, etc. Any of these features helps producing better products at lower cost, with less labor, while preserving resources, environment and social equilibrium: this is the very definition of sustainable development.

In effect, in the near future, the present state of the biosphere will made such types of changes necessary for many agricultural systems. Physico-chemical pressures will have to be reduced, genes will have to be increasingly pulled, and this will not be done with yesterday nor even today varieties. In each region, a better adjustment of varieties to cropping potential and natural constraints, as well as to human requirement, will have to be sought for. Beside, one should rely increasingly on associated crop patterns of species, the complementary characters of which having been enhanced, or on blend of lines of the same specie, each of which possessing different genes of resistance to a variable parasite, etc. A nearly total upheaval, affecting the whole society is taking place. In such a situation, only acknowledging the citizen right to bear opinions is not enough. For everybody, including experts, arousing interest of the public at such a point as to induce it to consent the cultural effort necessary for a participation to debates is even better

Now, in order to prepare future with the required prudence, Europe should have developed research, information, discussions, experiments, control, and field trials monitoring. Instead, through unsupported accusations, it locked itself into a practical blockade: with moratoria, authorized trial destructions, etc, procrastination dominates, while other nations are pressing development of transgenic varieties which, by now are covering about fifty million ha, and which are presently being improved by many breeders. As for accidents, if, in such a new domain, one can easily imagine a number of them harming consumers or ecosystems, nothing important occurred until now.

Thus, one get the impression that, whenever transgenesis is concerned, the widening of manhood's technological arsenal is going to be elaborated outside Europe. After having supplied the basis for the "ecological" contestation which is presently blocking Europe, the USA are now ready to supply continuously improved transgenic breeds - because they avoided to get blocked! One must be aware, and should take account of the fact that decisions processes in Europe are not the same as in the US. Meanwhile, Europeans left to others the task of exploring - and , ultimately, of orienting - the choices opened to the manhood in this important domain, even although they had all the capacity to make through for the best achievement at world's service.

Whatever its acknowledged merits, any new technology is perturbing, uncertainty bearing, and likely to introduce risks of abuses in various domains. In this respect, present disequilibria do not originate in transgenesis, which by itself will not be able to cure them. In fact, trangenesis is just an easy scapegoat to focus on itself all technologically induced fears. In Europe, debates are confused, and far from reality. Research and Enterprise, whose hybridizing just gave out the only real dragoon of our time, can and should help without arrogance clarifying the present discussion: Society should take in account the capital role of technological culture.

An historical roundabout will help keeping the debate dispassionate. The history of the recombination of "naturally" separated genes will be recalled : the creation of the first recombined lines from the crossing between highly different and geographically remote wheats; The creation of triticale from rye and wheat hybridization; The rebuilding of the phyloxera damaged European vineyard by the association, through grafting and hybridization, between vinifera and american vines.