Page 56 - Breeding Edge ebook

“The point is that, today, we know that the methods are not dangerous. People have been looking
for problems associated with simply using molecular techniques for 30 or 40 years now and
haven’t found them,” she declared.
She believes Americans have “tied ourselves into unbelievable irrational knots” over policy on biotech
crops. She said she watched what she considered a slow but reasonable path toward public review and
acceptance of transgenic crop enhancements for many years.
But, Fedoroff said, “in about the last decade it has become something different. Basically, the organic
marketers decided that they could gain market share by vilifying GMOs, and that’s what they started to
do.”
She says Greenpeace and other environmental and consumer groups have picked up the practice of
condemning biotech foods primarily to raise money and without regard to science. She said she doesn’t
know if the resulting tide of opinion against biotechnology leaves room for gene editing to advance in
years ahead.
Specter, the New Yorker writer, favors gene editing himself and generally agrees with Fedoroff that
biotech in agriculture has suffered from campaigns of untruth.
“People are paid for, and attracted to, extremely engaging and horrifying stories. It’s cheap and
it’s easy,” Specter said. His solution: “You have to fight misinformation and lies with the truth. I
don’t know any shorthand for that.”

54 www.Agri-Pulse.com