SOYBEAN.COM's Biotech Education Series

Recent Comments from the Scientific Community
On Our Biotechnology Position

A brief note to congratulate you on your balanced and well informed contribution to the so called debate on GM FOOD and Biotechnology in general. Keep up the good work.

Prof. C. J. Leaver FRS, FRSE
Head Department of Plant Sciences
University of Oxford
South Parks Road
Oxford -- OX1 3RB
February 6, 2000
As a researcher and Cooperative Extension Specialist in Biotechnology at the University of California, I support your company’s continued use of genetically engineered ingredients. I applaud you for your stated objective to use genetically modified ingredients in your in-house brands.
I expect companies to use scientific evaluations to ensure the quality and integrity of their products. In the long run it does not pay for companies to bend to the hysteria of the moment, especially if it does not have basis in scientific fact. Most scientific experts agree that the issues with GMO foods are not food safety issues; rather they are consumer choice issues.
Actions that perpetuate the marginalization of a very safe technology will delay the implementation of biotechnology, and will result in delays in the use of these crops in reducing environmental degradation caused by certain present farming practices. It is necessary to develop new tools that can be used by farmers to produce the same amount of food on fewer acres with fewer chemical inputs. Biotechnology is one of those tools that will become increasingly important in achieving this goal. In addition, taking a stand against biotechnology compromises a company’s ability to capitalize off the nutritional improvements that will be brought in later generation GM foods. The power of the technology in the long-run to address environmental and nutritional problems will be irresistible.
Hence, I commend Lumen Foods for pledging to continue its use of GM products, and acknowledging the role of sound science in protecting the integrity of its products. You should take every step to guarantee that your corporate policies embrace every technology available- including biotechnology - that will help protect the environment and the world's agricultural resources. Sincerely,
Peggy G. Lemaux, Ph.D.
Department of Plant and Microbial Biology
University of California, Berkeley
E-mail: lemauxpg@nature.berkeley.edu
URL: http://plantbio.berkeley.edu/~outreach

What can I say? Keep up the good work. I don't know any credible scientist who doesn't agree with you.
Dr. D. Malcolm Livingstone
Plant Molecular Biologist
CSIRO, Australia

I just wanted to applaud your stance on GMO products. It is refreshing to hear from someone who has thought through the issues and can see the role GMOs can play in the world.
Prof. Wayne Parrott
Dept of Crop & Soil Sciences
The University of Georgia
Athens, GA 30602-7272
February 4, 2000

 I have read your web site about your stance on GM foods and may I applaud you on your reasoned and balanced approach to GM crops. As one of the people who have signed CS Prakash's declaration on biotechnology it is especially heartening to see that there are those in the vegetarian community who understand what biotechnology is about and not trying to crush its promise. The plant biotechnology community here in MSU (Michigan State University) was subjected to a fire-bombing by those who claim to protect the environment. That profoundly undemocratic act not alone undermines their argument but the worrying absence of any condemnation from the likes of Greenpeace or Jeremy Rifkin makes one wonder how valid anti-GM claims of the high moral ground really are. One just has to look at some of the requirements for campaign positions in Greenpeace USA's web site to see that either a strong belief in the environment or a credible education in science are not really required and what that means for how they base their anti-GM mantra on. Anyway I'm straying from my point which is to congradulate Lumen Foods on its biotechnology stance and its desire to distinguish fact from fiction and inform its customers accordingly.
Prof. Colm Lawler, Ph.D.
Michigan State University
February 7, 2000

I am writing to express my appreciation for your progressive and informed support for the use of genetically-engineered foods. Your company is leading the way in educating the consumer about the facts surrounding this issue and I'm sure you will come under fire from anti-GMO activists. I have been a vegetarian for over 30 years and my family and I regularly shop at natural food stores and food cooperatives. I am a strong supporter of GMOs because I believe they will reduce the amount of pesticide residues in our food and will also result in less land being needed for agriculture. Both of these things will benefit the environment and the consumer.
Again, thank you for coming out so publicly in support of GMO foods. It is the right stand.
Gregory B. Martin
Scientist, Boyce Thompson Institute
Professor of Plant Pathology, Cornell University
Ithaca, NY
February 10, 2000

 I just wanted to take a minute to write you and thank you for making an informed decision on GM foods, and to let you know your support is appreciated. As a scientist who also considers himself an (informed) environmentalist, I consider GM technology safe. While I wish organic farming in its traditional sense could feed the current expanding population, fact tends to dictate otherwise (especially if you don't want to see more wild land converted to farm land). GM technology holds the promise of producing more food, on less land, with less pesticide, which sounds amazingly similar to the goals of organic farming practices. As the message gets out, and major groups like yours support fact rather than hype, an increasingly informed public will be better able to distinguish truth from unsubstantiated claims.
Dr. Jeffrey S. Skinner
Department of Forest Sciences
321D Richardson Hall
Oregon State University
Corvallis, OR 97331-5752
Email: Jeffrey.Skinner@orst.edu

Congratulations and thank you for the stand you and Lumen Foods are taking on recombinant DNA-modified food crops! I am a biochemist who has worked since 1973 on mechanisms of disease resistance in plants. I am dedicating my professional life to learning how we can produce safer, more nutritious, and more abundant food. I am grateful for your leadership in keeping the door open to the fruits of plant biological research.
Margaret Essenberg
Regents Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
246B Noble Research Center
Oklahoma State University
Stillwater, OK 74078-3035
February 24, 2000


 I don't know you or anything about your company, but I applaud your stand on continuing to use GMO plant derived ingredients in your food products. Frankly I am disappointed that several large food manufacturers have given in to the hysterical reactions to GMOs in the media and pressure from interest groups and believe your well reasoned approach is helpful in turning the tide. We are on the verge of a technological revolution in food production and entirely new products from crops and we need to be careful. However a blanket NO is the not the way to go. I hope that many others in your industry will benefit from your leadership.
Randall C. Rowe, Chairperson
Dept. of Plant Pathology, 1680 Madison Ave.
The Ohio State University, OARDC, Wooster 44691-4096 USA
ROWE.4@OSU.EDU


 Thank you for your well written, common sense, approach to genetically modified foods. I learned of your site through several of other contact sites that I use in my teaching (Fumento, Prakash, Milloy, Avery (I have taught classes with Dennis). Although we probably wouldn't agree on animal agriculture issues, at least we would agree that nutrition should be based on truth and science rather than myth and misinformation. I am adding your "education series" to my recommended sites for students.

Pat Tigges - EAT First!
PNAA Education Foundation
2381 Lambert Rd., Cle Elum, WA 98922
Ph: 509-674-9727 Fx: 509-674-9733
February 7, 2000
I am a Professor of Microbiology at the University of Illinois, who has testified on GMOs before the EU, the Nordic Ministers, the Canadian equivalent of our FDA, the US FDA and a Congressional subcommittee. I have heard all of the arguments and I can assure you that your stance is refreshingly sensible. You are to be commended for taking such a forthright stance.
The real danger of the anti-GMO movement is that the activists will divert public attention away from the pressing need to force Monsanto et. al. to produce more useful products. The anti-biotech forces have no interest in influencing the plant biotech companies to move in better directions, even though it would help the developing world as well as us.
Again, congratulations on your announcement.

Prof. A. Salyers
University of Illinois
February 7, 2000

 I am a member of the AgbioWorld coalition and I just wanted to voice my support for your strong stand for GMO use. I am a researcher at USAMRIID (U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectous Diseases) and I know all too well how many other legitimate health issues there are currently facing consumers. I would like to add I have never purchased anything from your company but that will change in about a week...

Robert P. Webb, Ph.D.
Robert.Webb@DET.AMEDD.ARMY.MIL

 I am a scientist writing to commend you on your stand FOR GMO foods. Your company is brave to speak out on such a controversial topic, but you have my support and that of many other rational members of the public. By the way, I had never heard of your company before, but as a result of your stance on this issue I will be looking over your web site and buying something. I can't say the same about Frito Lay.
Dr. Jeff Hall - (2/7/00)


[Editor: An email from the following German academic, while praising our GMO position, took issue from some of our political commentary.]
I have read your statements about GMO. This is all exactly what has to be said about it. I admire your courage as a company in the food business to go against the stream. I will take some of my rare free-time to talk to audiences to help change the attitude here locally...
Just one critical comment on your message. I believe it is a common misunderstanding amongst those that look at Europe from the other side of the Atlantic that the anti-GMO climate is due to political activism/protectionism.
This is certainly true for some activist group. However, the average European is not interested in politics at all. Please do not underestimate that their IS a feeling of real fear for the unknown and misunderstood. You refer to the microwave story, but people here refer to items like asbest and pesticides (that were once presented as fully free of risk, although we know better nowadays).
I experienced (through debates in public) that it is important to show that you understand this fear, besides bringing all the reassuring arguments. Those who directly run into the arguments in a rather arrogant way fail to convince European people. Risk is judged differently among Europeans and Americans. Besides, your argument about plant biotech products being developed exclusively by Americans is not correct (maybe you refer to the European viewpoint) . Although it is true that the USA leads the field, don't forget that the Europeans are still very prominent in the agbiotech game with giants like Novartis/Zeneca (now fused as Syngenta), Hoechst/Rhone-Poulenc (now fused as Aventis), Bayer and BASF.

Willem Broekaert
Director R&D of CropDesign
Part-time Professor at University of Leuven
February 7, 2000

 Thanks for your honest look at GM foods. I'm not a vegetarian and don't hold to all of your views, but it was really refreshing to read your take on GM foods. Your common sense, as opposed to so much of the superstition and fear mongering about GM foods, serves you well.
Name & Position Withheld (2/7/00)

I support your soybean gene work. Go to it.

Paul Geiger
Assoc. Prof. Emer.
U.S.C. School of Medicine
Los Angeles

 Your position on GMO crops has me thinking: 'at last a respite from all the idiocy.' I will be buying all of the GMO laden products under your label I can find!
M. Metz - U.C. Berkeley (2/5/00)

Thanks for having the courage to stand up for what you believe in, and what is scientifically sound. I hope your actions are an example to other food processors of the value of genetically enhanced crops. Hopefully your peers will also take a deeper look at the doom and gloom scenarios painted by the eco-activists and realize that they are simply wrong.
My company, Ceres, is a plant genomics company that is discovering plant genes and their functions by applying technologies such as high-thruput DNA sequencing, expression microarrays, gene knock-ins and knock-outs. We firmly believe that the promise of ag-biotechnology far outweighs the potential risks and with intelligent oversight and review can safely and effectively be used to provide a safer, healthier environment for us all.
Richard Hamilton, Ph.D.
Chief Financial Officer
Ceres, Inc.
Malibu, CA 90265 - (2/24/00)

 Congratulations on your informed, publicized, and simply rational stance on GM products.
It is refreshing to see, and I wish you success in publicizing it well.
It should make the executives at spineless companies, such as Frito Lay, twinge as they look in the mirror and talk to their children. Working to prevent a major new technology from being used in pursuit of short-term profit, as Frito-Lay is doing, is inexcusable for a large company that has the resources to know better and defend their decision in public.

Name & Position Withheld (2/6/00)

I salute you on your stand in regard to GMO products. GM Ag technology is a boon to the global environment. When in the market, I will actively seek out your products.

Name & Position Withheld (2/7/00)

Thanks for your honest look at GM foods. I'm not a vegetarian and don't hold to all of your views, but it was really refreshing to read your take on GM foods. Your common sense, as opposed to so much of the superstition and fear mongering about GM foods, serves you well. Good luck and best wishes.

Name & Position Withheld (2/7/00)

A note to express my support for your pro-GMO position. Support for the GMO's that are currently being used for food production will also help those who are developing products that will improve all aspects of our lives.

Mr. Bret Norman


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