Can animal genes be jammed into plants? Would tomatoes with catfish genes
taste fishy? Have you ever eaten a genetically modified food? The answers
are: yes, no and almost definitely. But according to a survey, most
Americans couldn't answer correctly even though they've been eating
genetically modified foods - unlabeled - for nearly a decade.

"It's just not on the radar screen," said William Hallman, associate
director of the Food Biotechnology Program at the Rutgers Food Policy
Institute, which conducted the survey.

Today, roughly 75 percent of U.S. processed foods - boxed cereals, other
grain products, frozen dinners, cooking oils and more - contain some
genetically modified, or GM, ingredients, said Stephanie Childs of the
Grocery Manufacturers of America.

Despite dire warnings about "Frankenfoods," there have been no reports of
illness from these products of biotechnology. Critics note there's no
system for reporting allergies or other reactions to GM foods.

Nearly every product with a corn or soy ingredient, and some containing
canola or cottonseed oil, has a GM element, according to the grocery
manufacturers group.

In the Rutgers survey, less than half the people interviewed were aware GM
foods are sold in supermarkets. At the same time, more than half wrongly
believed supermarket chicken has been genetically modified.

So far, non-processed meat, poultry, fish and dairy products, and fruits
and vegetables (both fresh and frozen) are not genetically modified.

GM food first hit supermarkets in 1994, with the highly touted Flavr Savr
tomato, altered to give it a longer shelf life and better flavor. It
flopped, in part due to disappointing taste, and disappeared in 1997, said
Childs.

By 1995, farmers in several countries had planted millions of acres of GM
corn and soybeans, and processed products containing them were in grocery
stores.

Genetic modification of crops involves transferring genes from a plant or
animal into a plant. Nearly all GM changes so far are to boost yields and
deter insects and viruses, cutting the use of pesticides, thus making
farming more productive and affordable - a particular aid to developing
nations.

More than 80 percent of the soy and 40 percent of the corn raised in this
country is a GM variety. Global plantings of biotech crops - mostly corn
and soybeans and much of it for animal feed - grew to about 200 million
acres last year, about two-thirds of it in the United States.

The one billionth acre will be planted this spring, according to the
Biotechnology Industry Organization.

Experts say within several years there will be new GM foods with taste and
nutrition improvements: cooking oils with less trans fat, tastier potatoes
and peanuts that don't trigger allergies.

At North Carolina State University, one of the biggest U.S. plant breeding
programs, scientists are developing drought-tolerant wheat and are a
couple years from field testing GM peanuts that have no life-threatening
allergens, said Steven Leath, associate dean for health research.

At Rutgers University's agricultural college, plant biology professor
Nilgun Tumer and colleagues modified potatoes to better keep their flavor
when processed as french fries and to limit browning when sliced, but she
said farmers haven't adopted the new varieties. Now her team is trying to
give tomatoes a gene to make a compound that helps prevent cancer and
osteoporosis.

Lisa Lorenzen, a liaison to the biotech industry at Iowa State University,
said most Americans haven't worried about GM foods because they trust the
regulatory system. She said many Europeans oppose GM foods because they
don't trust governments that wrongly insisted for years that the beef
supply, tainted by mad cow disease, was safe.

Opponents say genetically modified foods could cause allergic or toxic
reactions and harm the environment. Worries include the mixing of GM crops
with regular ones either by handlers, or pollen - already documented - and
GM foods being sold where they're not approved.

On Tuesday, a Swiss biotech company said it mistakenly sold U.S. farmers
an experimental, unapproved GM corn seed, and tons of the resulting corn
was sold between 2001 and 2004. U.S. government agencies say there was no
health or environmental risk.

In 2000, recalls, lawsuits and public uproar followed disclosure that
StarLink GM corn, approved only for animal use, had gotten into taco
shells and chips.

University plant scientists, industry, the Food and Drug Administration
and numerous European science agencies say GM foods are safe.

"Nobody's been able to prove that anyone's even gotten the sniffles from
biotechnology," Childs said.

But Margaret Mellon of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said there's no
system to track health problems caused by GM foods.

Her group, along with the Center for Science in the Public Interest, has
long pushed for labeling - only required when GM products have properties
different from ordinary foods, such as a higher nutrient content. They
contend consumers deserve a choice if they want to avoid GM foods and they
also want government regulation.

Currently, companies developing GM foods voluntarily send their data to
the FDA, but there's no official approval before products go on sale.

"It's left up to the good nature of Monsanto or DuPont or other companies
to do the right thing," said Gregory Jaffe, director of the biotechnology
project at CSPI.

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On the Net:

Rutgers study: http://www.foodpolicyinstitute.org

Biotechnology Industry Association http://www.bio.org