The Frankenfood Myth: How Protest and Politics Threaten the Biotech Revolution

Few topics have inspired as much international furore and misinformation as the development of genetically modified foods. For thousands of years, farmers have bred crops for their resistance to disease, productivity, and nutritional value; and over the past century, scientists have used increasing more sophisticated methods for modifying them at the genetic level. But only since the 1970s have advances in biotechnology (or gene-splicing to be more precise) upped the stakes, with the promise of dramatically improved agricultural products - provoking public resistance far out of proportion to the potential risks. In this provocative and meticulously researched book, Henry Miller and Gregory Conko trace the origins of genesplicing, its applications, and the backlash from consumer groups and government agencies against so-called Frankenfoods - from America to Zimbabwe. They explain how anti-technology activism, bureaucracy, and business lobbying have resulted in a regulatory framework in which there is an inverse relationship between the degree of product risk and degree of regulatory scrutiny. The net result, they argue, is a combination of public confusion, political manipulation, ill-conceived regulation from government agencies, and ultimately, the obstruction of one of the safest and most promising technologies ever developed - with profoundly negative consequences for the environment and starving people around the world. The authors suggest a way to emerge from this morass, proposing a variety of business and policy reforms that can unlock the potential of this cutting-edge science, while ensuring appropriate safeguards. This book is guaranteed to fuel the ongoing debate over the future of biotechnology and its cultural, economic, and political implications.