Page 54 - Breeding Edge ebook

companies with a new product in the works need to ask, “Should we be doing this?” rather than, “Can
we do this?’

As might be expected, the coalition defines gene editing in very attractive terms: “Gene editing
makes precise, intentional and beneficial changes in the genetic material of plants and animals
used in food production, which can improve their health and sustainability. This often mirrors
changes that could occur in nature or through traditional breeding. Gene editing helps farmers
keep pace . . . while using less water, land, nutrients and other resources.”

On the other hand, Arnot expects the coalition’s guidelines may change as its membership broadens, and
he thinks public acceptance for GE won’t be easy.

“Our next step is to engage the food system … to begin to answer concerns that food companies
may have about gene editing, what it might mean to their supply chain … to bring forth products
with potentially improved shelf life or nutrition,” he said.

On the opposite biotech policy front, nearly all advocates of organic food and farming, many of them
versed in biotechnology, are opposed to new GE techniques, just as they’ve been to earlier transgenic
plant and animal products – at least in terms of any such biotech in organic production.

“As an organic community,” said Abby Youngblood, executive director of the National Organic
Coalition, “we have a framework for looking at what is and what is not prohibited in organic, and we

have definitions of what we mean when we talk about genetic engineering that align with international
definitions that have been adopted by (world plant regulating bodies).”

Also, the U.S. organic program has “equivalency agreements with other countries,” Youngblood says,
and “there is really broad agreement that gene editing is prohibited in organic production.”

Just Label It and others who don’t like GMOs agree

with the organic folks and see gene editing as just

another GMO category that ought to be indicated on

labels. In its upcoming regs on GMO labeling, USDA
“should consider the terms ‘genetic engineering,’
‘genetic modification,’ and ‘biotechnology’ as
interchangeable with ‘bioengineering,’” JLI wrote to

USDA.

Scott Faber, Just Label It “This should be simple,” said Scott Faber, JLI
executive director. “Any product of genetic
engineering, whether it’s transgenic or gene editing

should be disclosed. Hiding information from
consumers is a recipe for more mistrust” from
consumers, and that isn’t in food industry interests,

he said.

Youngblood, meanwhile, notes her coalition is also concerned that exclusive patents granted for gene

editing laboratory processes or products might end up making valuable plant and animal genetics out of
bounds to researchers trying to breed new varieties for organic production. “We have a concern about
genetic material (not) remaining in the public realm,” she says.

52 www.Agri-Pulse.com