Page Title

GM corn poisons larvae

of monarch butterflies

A study led by Cornell University entomologist Dr John Losey has stepped up the opposition to genetically-manipulated (GM) crops. The study, published in Nature, May 20, 1999, found that pollen from GM corn killed the larva of the monarch butterfly, which, besides being regarded with affection, is considered an environmental indicator species.

This news is particularly worrisome in view of the fact that half the monarch population is estimated to occupy and migrate through the heart of the American corn belt between Nebraska and Ohio.

The corn (maize to Europeans) is manipulated by Novartis AG, Pioneer Hi-Bred International, and Monsanto to contain genes from the Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) organism to kill the European corn borer.

Caterpillars who ate milkweed leaves Cornell scientists had dusted with pollen from Bt corn grew more slowly, and 44% of them were dead after four days compared to no deaths in the control group not subjected to the pollen from Bt corn.

Last year, a Swiss study showed that lacewings, a valuable predator insect, who ate corn borers from Bt corn, died sooner than the controls who ate corn borers from unmanipulated corn.

A Scottish toxicologist claims potatoes with insect-resistant genes caused shrunken brains in rats and interfered with their growth and immune systems.

Jeremy Rifkin of Foundation on Economic Trends, who is pushing for a moratorium on GM crops, likened the monarch event to a "smoking gun" and a "red flag", but Losey thinks "the benefits...outweigh the... risks."

Mexicans, including a group of intellectuals and Greenpeace, proud of hosting the monarchs in winter, are calling upon their government to ban Bt corn.

The British Medical Association is asking its government to do the same.

US farmers complain that EU resistance to Bt corn cost them $299 million last year while the big biotech companies say European mistrust is costing them millions.

various ABC/AP reports May 19-21/99

Some wider implications:

The Progressive Populist May 29, 1999

Rounding Up Hunters

By PETER DOWNS

It looks like the end is near for the hunting of wild game birds in the

Midwest. Predictions are the birds soon will start to disappear. And the

culprit won't be overhunting, but biotechnology.

Scientists at the Monsanto Company are hard at work on the technology to

establish crop uniformity, wiping out the weeds that support many types of

wild game. They have perfected it for corn, soybeans and cotton, and they

have programs underway to extend the technology to a dozen other crops.

The core of Monsanto's technology is glyphosate, a patented 20-plus year old

herbicide marketed under the trade name Roundup. Glyphosate is the atomic

bomb of herbicides: it kills everything. It is the best-selling herbicide

ever invented, and a cash cow for the company, accounting for 30% of

Monsanto's revenues.

Facing the expiration of its patents, the company looked for some way to tie

farmers to its herbicide so they couldn't stray to a potential generic

knock-off.

The solution was to engineer crops that could withstand Roundup. That had an

added benefit for the company: it let farmers use more of the herbicide each

season, since they could keep spraying it to kill weeds even after their

crops had begun to sprout.

The benefit for Monsanto comes with a cost, however, a cost to the

environment. "We already have a very simplified environment in the

agricultural heartland, but it is still weedy enough to support some

wildlife," said Dr. Orley "Chip" Taylor, a biologist at the University of

Kansas. "If we eliminate weeds, it will not support even this limited

diversity of wildlife."

Taylor thinks hunters will be the first to cry foul. "If [Monsanto] comes up

with Roundup-resistant mill and sorghum, they will take all the weeds out of

the system that support game birds," he said. "All you will have to do is

listen to the cries of the hunters who can't find pheasant or quail" to know

that diversity in the environment is collapsing.

Other species will be affected, too. Taylor, who also is director of the

Monarch Project, a collaborative U.S.-Canadian research project on Monarch

butterflies, said Roundup-resistant corn and soybeans already pose a threat

to that butterfly.

"We have just shown that 50 percent of the Monarchs that arrive in Mexico

arrive from the agricultural heartland of the U.S.," he said. Monarchs feed

off of milkweed, which grows in corn and soybean fields. The eradication of

milkweed is one of the main marketing pegs for Roundup resistant corn and

soybeans.

Yet evidence suggests "there is not enough milkweed in pastures and wild

areas to support the number of Monarchs we see," said Taylor. He is seeking

funding to definitely determine where Monarchs feed, before farmers plant so

many acres in Roundup-resistant seeds that it decimates the butterfly

population.

The British government's wildlife advisor, English Nature, has similar

concerns. It wants to find out if more effective weed killing will decimate

the song bird population before the herbicide resistance technology floods

the marketplace.

Monsanto, however, isn't waiting. Its quest for biouniformity doesn't stop at

the field's edge. In April the company announced it had agreements with three

lumber companies to develop Roundup resistant trees, so they could wipe away

weeds and non-economic trees from forest floors. The companies are

International Paper Co., Westvaco, and Fletcher Challenge Group of New

Zealand.

Such research conjures up the image of a countryside that resembles a well

manicured suburban lawn: no weeds or brush, but also no birds or wild game.

Is such a countryside really desirable, let alone sustainable?

Peter Downs is a freelance writer based in St. Louis

Summer 99 index CivAb index