The Age of Biotechnology

Such dangers include a detrimental opposition on forgiving health and the environment. Countries analogous Japan and the EU have banned imports of genetically engineered gos or foods made from them, scarcely within the past year the six-year moratorium on such(prenominal) products in the EU expired. Likewise, consumer advocacy groups have lobbied the government activity and the Food and Drug Administration for tighter controls over genetically engineered crops. magical spell science often promises progress and beneficial advances, others contend that bioengineering of this sort opens an entirely inscrutable worldly concern fraught with say-so disaster.

Scientists have introduced chicken genes into potatoes to make them more disease resistant. firefly genes have been introduced into the biological code of corn plants. To increase steroid alcohol production, Chinese hamster genes have been introduced into the genome of tobacco plants. Rifkin (1998) warned of the dangers of such genetic fitting a half decade ago: "Ecologists are unsure of the impacts of bypassing natural species boundaries by introducing genes into crops from wholly unrelated plant and brute species. The fact is, there is no precedent in narrative for this kind of shotgun experimentation" (37). This analysis will reckon at different kinds of foods ands crops that are being genetically engineered, in order to provide an assessment of the real and potential dangers such biotechnological experimentation poses for the ecosystem and human health.

biotech: New danger of solution to Africa's food deficit? (Apr 11, 2000). Africa News, 1-4.

In other words, scientists from many parts of the world are unsure of the potential dangers of genetically engineered foods and strongly urge caution in all respects of its creation and consumption. No one do-nothing predict the potential dangerous genetic mutations that might fade from this form of biotechnology. Like Dr. Frankenstein who was able to create life but created a monster, so many argue that genetically engineered foods may have an extremely negative impact on human health and/or the ecosystem. In one article authorize Frankenfoods?

, the authors present a futuristic scenario in which private companies or government agencies gain control of newly engineered crops that are radical staples for millions the world over. As Rhodes, Alkhazindar, and Schiller (2003) relate, "Multinational corporations plunder genes from third world countries, which they immediately plant and then hold hostage, making the natal farmers of these countries by back the rights to grow their own seeds?How can a company own the most important food crop in the world?" (2).

Rhodes, B., Alkhazindar, M. M., and Schiller, N. (Aug 8, 2003). Frankenfoods? Viewed on Sep 1, 2004: http://www.science cases.org/gmfoods/gmfoods.asp, 1-5.

Lapan, H. E. and Moschini, G. (Aug 2004). origination and trade with endogenous market failure: The case of change products. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 86(3), 634-648.

Rifkin's (1998) reservations over genetically engineered organisms is similar to a majority of scientists and opponents of such foods and crops, in that the actual impact of such foods remains a potentially dangerous unknown: "Genetically engineered organisms are inherently more unpredictable than petrochemicals in the way they interact with other living things in the environment. It is some(prenominal) more difficult to assess all of the potential impacts that a genetical
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