Ethical Issues Arising from Agricultural Biotechnology

1
Ethical Issues Arising from Agricultural
Biotechnology

• Robert Streiffer, Ph. D.
• University of Wisconsin-Madison

2
Relevant Moral Principles

• We have a moral duty to show proper respect for
  nature.
• We have a moral duty to not harm or impose
  unreasonable risk of harm on people.
• We have a moral duty to respect the rights of
  animals and to take their welfare into account.
• We have a moral duty to preserve and protect the
  environment.
• We have a moral duty to avoid activities with
  unjust social consequences.

3
Biotechnology per se

• The Playing God ArgumentThe consciousness
  that whatever man does to improve his condition
  is in so much a censure and a thwarting of the
  spontaneous order of Nature, has in all ages
  caused new and unprecedented attempts at
  improvement to be generally at first under a
  shade of religious suspicion as being in any
  case uncomplimentary, and very probably offensive
  to the powerful beings (or, when polytheism gave
  place to monotheism, to the all-powerful Being)
  supposed to govern the various phenomena of the
  universe, and of whose will the course of nature
  was conceived to be the expression. John Stuart
  Mill

4
Plants

• Consumer Issues
• Environmental Issues
• Socioeconomic Issues
• Humanitarian Issues

5
Plants Consumer Issues

• Food Safety
• Allergenicity
• Negative effects on nutrients
• Introduction or increase of toxins
• Labeling

6
Plants Environmental Issues

• Modified crop could become a weed, negatively
  effecting natural ecosystems
• Transgenes could spread to nearby relatives,
  negatively effecting natural ecosystems
• Direct or indirect negative effects on non-target
  organisms

7
Plants Socioeconomic Issues

• Negative effects on prices
• Increasing yield in regions where there is
  already a surplus can push down prices, hurting
  farmers
• Negative effects on small farms
• Many technologies are not scale neutral.
• Negative effects on organic farms
• Increased resistance to Bt, an important tool to
  organic farmers

8
Plants Humanitarian Issues

• The most important stakeholders in this whole
  debate are those who are suffering from food
  shortages.
• Some 80,000 infants die every two days from the
  effects of malnutrition.
• It is estimated that by 2020, farmers will have
  to produce 40 more grain than they do know,
  despite little room for expanding agriculture
  onto new land.

9
Plants How Can GE Food Help?

• Increases in yield
• Expanded crop range
• Virus resistance
• Pest resistance
• Reduced need for chemical inputs,
• Increased nutritional properties

10
Plants Vitamin A Deficiency

• VAD causes about 1 million deaths per year.
• 230 million children are at risk for VAD.
• VAD causes about 500,000 cases of childhood
  blindness per year.

11
Plants Golden Rice

• Ingo Potrykus led a team of researchers to
  engineer rice so that it produces beta carotene,
  which the body can convert into vitamin A, on the
  inside of the rice.
• Although no one thinks that genetic engineering
  should be relied on exclusively to solve problems
  of hunger, it will someday be a valuable tool to
  have in addition to other methods.

12
Animals

• Many issues are similar to those that arise in
  the case of plant biotechnology
• Consumer Issues
• Environmental Issues
• Socioeconomic Issues
• Humanitarian Issues
• Animal welfare and animal rights considerations

13
Animals Two Main Applications

• Growth hormone genes are inserted into the animal
  to either affect overall size, speed of growth,
  milk production, or fat to muscle ratios.
• Affect the environmental impact of agricultural
  practices

14
Animals - Enviropigs

• Last year, researchers at the University of
  Guelph in Ontario, Canada. reported in Nature
  Biotechnology that they had spliced E. Coli and
  mice genes into pigs which caused them to produce
  phytase in their saliva. The phytase broke down
  phosphorous in their diet, resulting in a 75
  reduction in the amount of phosphorous in their
  manure, compared to a 56 reduction achievable by
  the present method of adding phytase to feed.

15
Animals - Enviropigs

• "It demonstrates that genetically modified
  animals can have a beneficial effect on the
  environment - that the two can go hand in-hand.
• Harry Gilbert, an agricultural biochemist at the
  University of Newcastle, UK.

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Animals - Enviropigs

• The limiting factor on the size of hog farms is
  the regulatory limit on phosphorous output.
  Speaking generally, Clare Schlegel, chairperson
  for Ontario Pork, says The environmental
  barriers are the largest in terms of growing as
  an industry. So it might be the case that rather
  than reducing overall phosphorous output, the hog
  farms will just get larger, with a resulting
  increase in the other negative environmental
  impact of the farms.