Dr Palanisamy Nagarajan, UPEI

Aquaculture is “the farming of aquatic organisms including fish, molluscs, crustaceans and aquatic plants in selected or controlled environments,” according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 1997.

With collapsing marine fisheries, mostly due to overfishing without foresight, and increasing impoverishment of the marine ecosystems resulting from short-sighted exponential growth of economic activities, aquaculture has emerged as one of the fastest-growing food producing sectors in the world, with more than three-fold increase in production during the past 15 years.

In 2007, aquaculture contributed 43 per cent of the aquatic animal food for human consumption.

In fact, the growth of aquaculture is likely to accelerate in the coming decades, particularly in the context of rapidly developing transgenic technology in aquaculture, the technique of transferring genetic material from one organism into the DNA of another, for transforming fish and other aquatic organisms. Marine ecologist Steve Palumbi, Center For Ocean Solutions at Stanford University, who is one of the co-authors of an exhaustive four-year study in dealing with the impacts of biodiversity loss on ocean ecosystem services, warns that “unless we fundamentally change the way we manage all the ocean species together, as working eco-systems, then this century is the last century of wild [sea] food.” 

No one can deny the apparent short-run benefits of the application of modern biotechnology to aquaculture. Nevertheless, the long-term irreversible environmental and ecological risks should not be overlooked. We have already entered the uncharted waters of messing up with the gene and remaking of the world. Jeremy Rifkin, the author of a provocative and influential book The Biotech Century (1998) observes: “The long-term cumulative impact of thousands of introduction of genetically modified organisms could well exceed the damage that has resulted from the release of petrochemical products into the Earth’s ecosystem. With these new biologically based products, the damage is not easily containable, the effects continue to reproduce, and the organisms cannot be recalled, making the process irreversible.”

Research on genetically engineered fish, mostly for aquaculture industry, is currently underway for approximately 35 species worldwide. Until now, no country has approved any of these species for commercial production or human consumption. In fact, ecological risks associated with transgenic fish are very sketchy. 

The AquAdvantage Salmon, a genetically engineered Atlantic salmon developed by AquaBounty Technologies, a company headquartered in Waltham, Mass., is almost in the final stage of getting approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to enter the food system after a very long waiting period. A decade ago, science writer Dr. Carol Kaesuk Yoon wrote: “With quaint fishing villages dotting its shores and farming still one of its mainstays, the pastoral landscape of Prince Edward Island seems an unlikely place to encounter one of the most modern creatures on earth. Yet it is in the tanks at Aqua Bounty Farms on the island off New Brunswick, Canada, that hundreds of truly novel fish swim: schools of genetically engineered salmon that await approval for sale in the United States” (New York Times, May 1, 2000).

Comprehending the fact that after waiting for a long time the ‘AquAdvantage Salmon’ is about to enter the food system without undergoing across-the-board environmental and ecological risks assessment is difficult. It is also perplexing that in advance of three days of public hearings on this most critical issue, beginning Sept. 19, 2010, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released a report stating that the transgenic fish are safe to eat and “unlikely” to harm the environment. How did the Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee of the FDA arrive at these premature conclusions on such vital matters that would ultimately affect the fragile marine ecosystems, particularly before hearing from the public at large? What is the purpose of holding public hearings, if they have already made up their mind? What are the roles of other departments/agencies concerned with the environmental and ecological issues in the United States?

Our complex and dynamic society is undergoing rapid technological changes, and our scientific knowledge concerning their long-term environmental, ecological and human health impacts are not keeping pace with them. When making the crucial policy decisions under high degree of uncertainty, we should be guided by the precautionary principle or ‘foresight principle’ in dealing with serious, emerging though not-proven risks to our fragile, complex ecosystems.

The decision to approve the transgenic fish, without paying serious attention to the well-recognized precautionary principle, would open the floodgate for numerous transgenic aquatic organisms to enter our food systems. It is high time we avoid playing dice with our complex ecosystems, particularly when our understanding of the ecosystems is fuzzy and far from perfect.

If AquAdvantage Salmon is approved by the U.S. FDA, one wonders whether Prince Edward Island can be heralded as the birthplace of this transgenic fish, which is supposed to grow to market size in 18 months as compared to 36 months for normal salmon. 

Dr. Palanisamy Nagarajan is emeritus professor of economics and research associate of the Institute of Island Studies, Charlottetown.

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