Environmental Defense Organization on Bt Corn

1
Environmental Defense Organization on Bt Corn

• Presented by
• Jeremy Archer
• Rebecca Echols
• November 12, 2002

2
Environmental Defense Organization

• We are a privately founded operation that is
  determined to make environmental policies fairly
  and properly regulated by the federal government
• We are guided by the sciences, meaning that we
  care about the scientific research and not how
  policies will effect political parties

3
Bt Corn Problems and Concerns

• Ecological problems
• Benefit analysis concerns
• Resistance management concerns
• Human Safety concerns
• Recommendations

4
Ecological concerns

• Bt toxins exposure pathways and impacts
• interaction between introduced gene genome
• physiological interactions
• Impact on non-target organisms, including monarch
  butterflies
• Lethal levels of Bt have been found to be similar
  to the concentration of pollen found in Bt corn
  fields
• Impacts on bees, ground beetle

5
Benefit Analysis Concerns

• EPA estimated annual benefit to be 38-219
  million
• Actual benefit much less because of EPAs
  inflated estimate
• Estimates for reduction in corn pesticides low
• Originally 30 reduction, moved to a 5-8
  reduction
• Inappropriate and inaccurate data
• Not on real farms
• Short term data, no long term data
• Lack of follow up studies

6
Monarch Butterflies

• Bt corn might present a risk
• Poor experimental design
• Small test samples
• 5 larvae with 5 replications
• Inadequate and vague critique/presentation of
  results
• potential
• seems to be due to the effect of Bt toxin
• (Losey Raynor, 1999)

7
EPA

• We are confident that Bt corn does not pose
  risks to human health and the environment
  Stephen Johnson
• Poor research
• Dated research in reports
• Tested aquatic animals instead of animals
  effected by corn pollen
• Estimated inflated earnings
• Price premium has yet to exceed gain in yield

8
Resistance

• Cross-resistance (Griffitts et al. 2001)
• Animals already demonstrate a homozygous dominant
  resistance
• Tobacco bugworm ( Gahan, Gould Heckel)
• Insect resistance could create a more aggressive
  weed

9
Human Safety Concerns

• Allergenicity
• Cry9C and Starlink
• Inadequate testing methods
• Protein breakdown is not reliable
• No predictive methodology for allergen testing
• Immunological effects
• Incomplete data- no antibody levels

10
Recommendations

• Restrictions should be conditional
• Dependent upon region and animal life in the area
• Refuges do not need to be more that 1/10 of a
  mile from the planted regions, instead of ¼ of a
  mile
• Scientifically appropriate methodology for
  evaluating transgenic crops
• Specifically the hazard-only approach
• More effective plans for resistance management