Biotechnology and GM: it's time for politics to listen to science

The light at the end of the tunnel can't be seen yet, but sooner or later it will appear. Even on the age-old question of biotechnologies used in the agri-food sector, where Italy is perched on a debate between those in favor and against genetically modified plants (GM). Leaving room for political choices that have decreed 'tout court' the ban on cultivation and experimentation, to the detriment of science and knowledge on the part of all citizens.

Thus Elena Cattaneo, biotechnologist at the University of Milan and life senator, made her debut at a conference organized yesterday by the Georgofili Academy in Florence, summarizing the state of the art on the relationship between science, politics and society.

On background, a judgment of the European Court of Justice of last July 25, which on a regulatory level risks equating plants obtained by crossing the same species, through mutagenesis techniques, and genetically modified organisms (GMOs). A sentence that in recent days, not surprisingly, also led the Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, Vytenis Andriukaitis, to urge the Member States to start a discussion aimed at a new regulatory framework. This by leveraging innovation and the need to increase crop yields in a sustainable way for consumers and the environment.

The meeting at the Georgofili was an opportunity to review a selection of the thousands of studies conducted on the subject in recent years. Among these, those produced in recent months by the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna and the University of Pisa sul herbicide and insecticide resistant corn.

The objective of the researchers, but also of many farmers and operators active in this field, is to overcome the obscurantism which has fallen, more generally, on the application of techniques of genetic recombination of DNA, the acid which contains the information useful for the development of living things. And these are techniques that have been known for over fifty years, in any case aimed at increasing the yields of the main agricultural productions. But the research, or at least a preponderant part of it in Italy, also wants to turn the spotlight on other mutagenesis techniques, such as the 'Genome editing', known for 25 years, which do not introduce new DNA into cells, but induce mutations in specific sites. This, without distorting and altering the original nature of agricultural and food products, while helping plants to start a process of self-defense from the main diseases that can compromise crops.

Striking it is the case of the corn borer, a cereal of which in the last 35 years our country has seen two thirds of its value lose following the collapse of investments and prices. And at the origin of this debacle, the speakers who took part in Florence explained, certainly there are inadequate choices at the level of a common agricultural policy which has drastically reduced support for farmers, but above all Italy's decision to say 'no' to new disease resistant maize varieties. Which, as if that weren't enough, has forced our country to resort to increasing imports from abroad, especially from North America, to satisfy the demand from processors and the feed industry. Italy's trade deficit spending on corn alone is now close to one billion euros a year.

"Science is not truth, but a method, a set of actions, of procedures that become replicable in an expert hand – explained Cattaneo to the Georgofili audience – and we researchers must put kilos of evidence on the counter that must be made available to society. Which must induce the legislator to take note of it, even if in the end it is politics that decides”. “In my activity as a parliamentarian – added the senator for life – I am trying to make my colleagues understand the method for looking for evidence. But when reality is denied, an alternative is often invented and false narratives are resorted to”.

Only counter to these claims came with a note written by Susanna Cenni, Vice-President of the Agriculture Commission of the Chamber and former Councilor for Agriculture of Tuscany. "Science has the task of researching, investigating, studying, experimenting, innovating, making the results of its precious work available, doing all this with transparency and freedom, without conditioning - the parliamentarian reported - Politics, governments have the task of evaluating, choosing and deciding, regulating, directing, motivating one's choices, and to do so in the interest of the community that has given him a mandate. Society, citizens, organizations give their mandate. And they do it with the vote, with the participation, with their choices of consumers, or of cultivation, of production”.

“Merely ideological contrasts – added Cenni – have not helped in recent years, and still do not. It's not up to me to decide whether the new techniques of mutagenesis and genome editing are to be included among the GMOs and therefore to be subjected to the regulations in force regarding the authorizations for cultivation. If we think we need to investigate the issue of authorizations for these new techniques in a different way from GMOs, let's talk about it and develop adequate and transparent guarantees".