Implications of transgenics for environmental and agricultural sustainability

Abstract

The potential risks of GMOs, their impact on human and animal health, and on the environment, as well as their socioeconomic effects, have generated a worldwide discussion which is far from drawing to a close for lack of sufficient information. Part of this information supports risk-hypotheses previously put forward. Thus the presence of transgenic plant genes in other plants and in other organisms has been confirmed in several occasions. Therefore, gene dissemination to plants of the same species as well as to widely different species is already regarded as an actual risk. The principle of substantial equivalence has opened the way for the liberation of transgenic plants for commercial crops, despite short-term tests, which are quantitatively and qualitatively insufficient to certify that the foods deriving from those plants are healthy and safe. Thus, the adoption of the so-called precautionary principle (PP) has turned out to be the most adequate safety measure to date, or else until scientific data should be able to demonstrate the actual impact of transgenic plants on human and animal health, and on the environment.