THE FUTURE OF FOOD: SCIENCE FICTION OR NATURE? - Foodopoly: The Battle Over the Future of Food and Farming in America - page 164

Perhaps the conference planners sought to lighten the atmosphere of a scientific gathering that could affect
the future of the planet. 12
Synthetic biology is unregulated and self-governing. No one knows what could occur when synthetic
organisms are intentionally and unintentionally let loose into the environment. Creating genes that don't
exist in nature is a dangerous business and there is no way to predict how they will behave in living sys-
tems. Meddling with genetic material can have long-term unintended consequences in the food system and
the natural environment. No one knows what the final outcome will be, especially since synthetic biology
is practiced at a nano scale. Working at this scale means that scientists may not even be aware of important
biological processes they are altering.
Dr. Allison Snow of the Department of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology at Ohio State
University recently testified that these artificial life forms may seem innocuous or weak but they could
evolve to become more successful when they start reproducing. Once they are released into the environ-
ment there will be no way to take them back, because they can reproduce indefinitely. Snow questions the
ability of regulatory agencies to evaluate or monitor synthetic organisms that are proposed for release. 13
There is no doubt that synthetic biology is being hyped, and it's hard to tell how quickly it will advance
or if it can achieve even a fraction of what its cheerleaders say it can do. Like genetic engineering and
nanotechnology, synthetic biology is being touted as the savior of humanity for a hungry population estim-
ated to reach 9 billion people later in the century. Of course, you do not need to be too much of a cynic to
realize that these advanced technologies are more about making money than providing food to the world's
poor. And in fact the opposite is likely to occur since the energy applications of synthetic biology require
immense acreage of feedstocks to be grown that can then be turned into replacements for fossil fuels and
other magically produced commodities. Corporations are acquiring large areas of land around the world
for the purpose of growing “biomass” that can be turned into energy. From displacing peasant farmers in
Brazil and encroaching on the Amazon to massive land grabs on the African continent, synthetic biology
could result in even more control in the hands of a few corporations of energy, food, cropland, and re-
sources.
And we've heard the hype about technology feeding the world before. In fact, it's trotted out every time
scientists, corporations, and government join together to promote a new and usually dangerous technology.
Certainly the same proclamations have been made about nanotechnology feeding the world. Professor John
Beddington, the chief scientific adviser to the UK government and professor of applied population biology
at Imperial College London, told an Oxford Farming Conference that the world will have to produce 50
percent more food by 2030 in order to feed the growing population. He named nanotechnology and genetic
engineering as the technologies that would make this possible. 14
Synthetic biology is a subcategory of nanotechnology—the manipulation of matter at near atomic scale
to create new substances. The genetic manipulation that is the basis for creating new life happens at a nano
level. Because nano-size particles can go places that other particles cannot go, it also offers a more soph-
isticated way to manipulate genetic material or to move foreign DNA into cells. Research suggests that
atomic-sized particles are so small that they can pass through your skin and even through the tight, protect-
ive web of cells that create the blood-brain barrier. (To put these tiny particles in perspective, they compare
in size to about 1/50,000th of a strand of hair.)
At the 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting, the largest annual gath-
ering of scientists in the world, two University of Idaho academics organized a symposium on how bio-
technology, including genetic engineering, synthetic biology, and nanotechnology, will be used to produce
animal-based foods. The organizers, animal scientist Rod Hill and food scientist Larry Branen, are repres-
entative of the true believers in not only the human ability to improve upon nature, but also the right of a
handful of scientists to make choices that will have profound effects on the natural world. 15