Oops. The World Food Prize committees got a bit of egg on its facegenetically engineered egg. They justawardedthe World Food Prize to three scientists, including one from Syngenta and one from Monsanto, who invented genetic engineering because,they say, the technology increases crop yields and decreases pesticide use. (Perhaps not coincidentally, Monsanto and Syngenta are majorsponsorsof the World Food Prize, along with a third biotech giant, Dupont Pioneer.)

Monsanto makes the same case on itswebsite, saying, Since the advent of biotechnology, there have been a number of claims from anti-biotechnology activists that genetically modified (GM) crops dont increase yields. Some have claimed that GM crops actually havelower yields than non-GM crops GM crops generally have higher yields due to both breeding and biotechnology.

But thats not actually the case. A new peer-reviewed study published in theInternational Journal of Agricultural Sustainabilityexamined those claims and found that conventional plant breeding, not genetic engineering, is responsible for yield increases in major U.S. crops. Additionally, GM crops, also known as genetically engineered (GE) crops, cant even take credit for reductions in pesticide use. The studys lead author, Jack Heinemann, is not an anti-biotechnology activist, as Monsanto might want you to believe. Im a genetic engineer. But there is a different between being a genetic engineer and selling a product that is genetically engineered, he states.

The study compared major crop yields and pesticide use in North America, which relies heavily on GE crops, and Western Europe, which grows conventionally bred non-GE crops. The studys findings are important for the future of the U.S. food supply, and therefore for the world food supply since the U.S. is a major exporter of many staple crops.

Heinemann, a professor of molecular biology at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand and director of the Center for Integrated Research in Biosafety, says he first began looking into the matter after he heard a remark made by Paul Collier in 2010. Both Heinemann andCollier, an Oxford economics professor and author of the bestselling bookThe Bottom Billion, were speaking at a conference in Zurich.

Collier made the offhand remark during his talk that because Europe has shunned GMOs [genetically modified organisms], its lost productivity compared to the US, Heinemann recalls. That seemed odd to me. So while he was talking, I went to the FAO [UN Food and Agriculture Organization] database and I had a look at yields for corn. And over the short term, from 1995 to 2010, the US and Western Europe were neck and neck, there was no difference at all. So his assertion that lack of GMOs was causing Europe to fall behind didnt seem true.

Heinemann attempted to ask Collier for the source of his facts through the conferences Internet-mediated audience Q&A system, but he never got an answer. He continued poking around for data and stumbled upon what he calls the textbook example of the problems that come from a low genetic diversity in agriculture the 1970 Southern corn leaf blight epidemic.

Really what happened by 1970 was that upwards of 85 percent of the corn grown in the US was almost genetically identical, explains Heinemann. The US is the worlds biggest producer of corn and both geographically and in quantity, so when you cover that much land with a crop of such a low genetic diversity, youre simply asking for it to fail In 1970 a previously unknown pathogen hit the US corn crop and the US almost lost the entire crop. It was a major crisis of the day. The only thing that saved the corn crop was that the weather changed in 1971 and that weather change wasnt as favorable to the pathogen, so it gave farmers and breeders and extra year to swap over the corn germplasm to a variety that wasnt as vulnerable.

All told, the epidemic cost an estimated five trillion kilocalories in lost food energy, making it many times larger than the Irish potato famine, said Heinemann.

Now that was in a day where biofuels were not being made from corn. So there was no competition for those food calories Fast-forward to the drought of 2012. How many food calories were lost because of it? In kilocalories, its 89 trillion just from the drought. Thats just from an annual variation due to weather The U.S. is the biggest producer and exporter of corn.

See more here:
Study: Monsanto GMO food claims probably false

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