Down on the genetic farm 

Editorial / New Scientist 26may01

Super-pigs and monster chickens have never been the problem

A FEW WEEKS ago, at the height of Britain's outbreak of foot and mouth disease, a pet calf called Phoenix was sentenced to death to help slow the march of the disease. How the nation's tabloids wept. Some time after next month's general election there will be a big inquiry into this epidemic.

Perhaps it will conclude that it's time to overcome our squeamishness about genetic engineering and create genetically modified Phoenixes with inbuilt resistance to such diseases. That is certainly the view of Britain's top scientific club, the Royal Society. Its new report on the pros and cons of genetically modifying animals picks out disease prevention as an especially worthwhile goal.

Imagine the benefits, it says, of creating cows resistant to BSE and chickens impregnable to salmonella. Imagine what it would mean to African herdsmen if their cattle were given GM resistance to the trypanosomiasis parasite spread by the dreaded tsetse fly. 

The report makes lots of eminently sensible points. If GM fish are to be grown for food, it says, they should be farmed in landlocked waters and be made sterile to prevent them breeding with their unmodified wild cousins. Labs should be alert to the possibility of GM animals escaping. And any food produced from GM animals should be rigorously tested.

Yet the report's enthusiasm for some of the anticipated benefits of genetic engineering is misplaced. Despite its calls for more public funds for GM research, the real movers and shakers in this revolution will always be the big companies. Their interest will be in creating fast-growing, superlean pigs and cows for rich farmers, not animals that resist parasites in the developing world.

More fundamentally, why are animal diseases such a problem in countries like Britain anyway ? The answer lies less in the DNA of our cows and pigs and more in our subsidised system of intensive farming and long-distance trading in animals which encourages infections.

There is a danger that genetic modification will be used to shore up this system by making farm animals better equipped to survive cramped conditions.

Indirectly, it could even help to spread disease susceptibility by encouraging farmers to switch from genetically diverse breeds to high-yield GM animals drawn from a narrow gene pool. Nor will these creatures make farming less stressful. Judging from GM crops in North America, unleashing patented animals into the barnyard will not just strengthen the grip of big business on food production.

It will be a recipe for legal disputes over gene ownership and breeding rights. The Royal Society points out that, contrary to the popular myth, scientists aren't creating genetic monsters simply to satisfy their own curiosity.

True.

But the real threat from GM technology has never been one of giant chickens and pigs stalking the landscape. It is bound up with a raft of more prosaic economic and social issues.

Are GM farm animals a good or bad thing ? First ask what kind of farming you really want. And who will control and own the animals.

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File from Norfolk Genetic Information Network (ngin), http://www.ngin.org.uk