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Tests reveal presence of GM tomatoes in Turkey
Turkey working to form policy on genetically modified
organisms -Part II
by Michael Kuser
Turkish Daily News, 26 May 2005
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=1414
3
The introduction of transgenic
crops is especially sensitive in Turkey,
which boasts
a rich biological stock with over 12,000 species of
flora
and fauna. This compares to 13,000 in all of
Europe.
Archeologists have found the earliest
strains of domesticated wheat in
the fertile crescent
of ancient Mesopotamia, specifically at a site in
present day Turkey near the Syrian border.
A
bio-engineering scientist in Turkey with five years of
experience in
DNA testing of transgenic crops said
that she came to the subject with an
open mind,
"neither for nor against, but now the risk side seems
to
outweigh the benefits for me."
She declined to reveal her name while pursuing a court case
against her
university for this month reassigning her
to another department and
taking her lab away. The
researcher had raised funds from government and
industry (80,000 euros from the State Planning Organization
and 175,000
euros from Turkish food conglomerate
=DClker) to set up an independent
laboratory. She was
days away from final stage testing on seed samples
gathered around Turkey when the news came from her
rector.
The chairman of the Agricultural
Engineers Association, Gökhan Günaydin,
said they were aware of the woman's situation and were
writing a formal
letter of support.
"Where the pressure comes from is not clear, except
that the same
pressure is coming to our
association," he said. "They blame us as
anti-
GMO activists, but I stood up in Parliament
last month and said that we
have no financial ties to
any of these companies, unlike certain
academicians
who have a salary from their university and at the
same
time, take money as consultants to
industry."
Researchers in the UK
conducted tests on the effects on bio-diversity of
GM
oil seed rape and corn, studying the amount of weed seeds
and biomass
left after harvest. Overall results
showed a detrimental effect on wild
plants and
animals, though initial lower rates of herbicide
application
with the corn crop benefited insects and
birds.
The trouble in Turkey is that the
government is trying to please all
sides -- the
public, the EU and the United States.
"The ministry (agriculture) has changed its tune every
time, from no GM
seeds at all, to only some, to no GM
grain imports, to only those for
animal feed,"
said the university researcher.
For example,
Günaydin cited a study at Middle Eastern
Technical
University (METU) that found GM tomato
seeds in Turkey. "The minister of
agriculture
said it was not true, that testing was complicated and
that
the school must have made a mistake, but METU
researcher Candan Gurakan
came back and asserted that
foreign labs had confirmed the findings," he
said.
Everyone interviewed agreed that Turkish
customs does nothing to control
the importation of
GMO seeds. "Customs does absolutely no testing,
only
accepting the importer's declaration," said
Günaydin.
The temporarily anonymous
university researcher said she believes "GM
corn
and soy to be growing, Turkey's two largest crops, and of
course we
already found tomatoes." Testing is
difficult if you don't know what
you're looking for,
such as is required with protein-specific field tests.
Researchers worry about the risk to biodiversity
because the newly
introduced traits come from
dominant genes, which mean they may be very
difficult, if not impossible, to breed out. The woman
mentioned American
approval of patented crops in Iraq
as a real danger to Turkey's huge GAP
irrigation
project in the Southeast. The risk from cross-pollination
is
very real to one of the country's most important
agricultural production
areas.
"I
hear they are passing out free samples of the seed in
Manisa and
Adipazari, corn seed," said the
besieged researcher. "The ministry just
doesn't
want to be the one to say GMOs already exist in
Turkey."
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BOX
Genetic modification for agricultural purposes aims at
either making a
plant poisonous to insects or
tolerant to various herbicides.
The most
famous herbicide-related treatment prepares a plant to
tolerate
glyophosphate, a weed-killer patented by
Monsanto and marketed under the
trade name Roundup.
Crop seed bio-engineered to tolerate the herbicide is
marketed as Roundup Ready.
Chemical companies
involved in the business of developing biotechnology
for agricultural applications aim to "stack" the
genetic traits, so that
a corn resistant to certain
herbicides may also contain a protein toxic
to
insects.
The most common form of built-in
pesticide comes from transferring a gene
from a
common soil bacterium, Bacillus thuringiensis, into a
plant, say
corn, which then renders the corn's leaf
tissue toxic to caterpillars,
which feed on that
crop. Corn engineered this way is known as Bt corn.
END BOX
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