Maui’s GMO muddle

Over the past year, the agrochemical industry has conducted an unprecedented public relations campaign, to allay public fears about its intensive use of pesticides on the islands. The pesticide issue adds to questions about the risk of the year-round planting of experimental genetically modified crops in the state.

The most recent media campaign by the agrochemical industry aims to counter a public initiative that will be in the ballot in Maui County for the Nov. 4 election. The public initiative in question, signed by over 19,000 residents, calls for a temporary moratorium on the planting of genetically modified organism (GMO) crops.

As part of the GMO debate, the chemical industry claims to be on the high road in terms of its respect for the scientific process, while it derides supporters of the initiative for basing their positions on emotions and misinformation rather than on facts.

However, recent public relations statements made by the industry indicate that it is straying away from providing factual information. For instance, the media campaign appears to aim to evoke emotional and "irrational" fears within the community, based on unsubstantiated claims about the initiative.

» Contrary to what we hear from the chemical industry about the upcoming ballot initiative, the initiative is not a ban on farming, nor an attack on farmers. We estimate the initiative would impact less than 2 percent of the farming acreage and less than 1 percent of farmers in Maui County.

» The initiative would not stop agricultural activities of the seed companies. The seed companies could easily shift to grow non-GMO crops, as they are already doing in many parts of the world.

» Industry claims that there is no science behind the initiative. To the contrary, extensive data exists from the scientific literature concerning environmental, social and health risks from the planting of GM crops and associated chemical practices.

» No independent data has been put forward to substantiate the economic benefits that are attributed to the GMO industry. First, externality costs from the negative environmental and health impacts of this industry have not been included in the analysis. Secondly, the opportunity costs of adopting more productive agricultural systems have not been considered. For example, diversified operations with per-acre earnings of over $100,000 would contribute more to the state tax coffers than the $9,000 per acre reported for the GM seed industry.

The agrochemical industry cites third-party sources to assure that GMO farming is safe and well-regulated. The fact is that the claims of safety are based on studies that were conducted, not by independent scientists, but rather by the chemical industry itself. However, scientific reviews show that industry-sponsored studies have a negligible likelihood of reporting adverse effects. Independent scientific reviews have also found gaps with the government oversight of the chemical and GMO industry — with many toxic chemicals making it through the regulatory cracks and ending-up in our food, water, rivers and oceans.

The community discussion about the risks of pesticide-based GMO operations should be a welcomed development to anyone who supports the democratic process. On the other hand, the multimillion-dollar public relations campaign launched by agrochemical transnationals in this state, appears to be more of an effort to interfere with the community dialogue and thus with the democratic process of a small island community.

If the agrochemical industry is indeed engaged in a pubic relations campaign to purposely incite irrational fears among the public, with unsubstantiated statements such as "this initiative will kill farming in Maui County," this would then be counter to its claims of respect for the scientific process, and to its commitment of transparency and open dialogue with the community.