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People, who prefer organic food, tell that it is more nutritious than conventionally grown foods. But there is no official evidence to show that organic food really contains more nutrients than non-organic foods. It is only known that organic food contain more vitamin C and have higher quality protein content. One more fact that is known for sure is that animals grown with organic feeds are usually healthier than animals fed conventional feeds.
According to Shereen Jegtvig, the organic farming is not only better for the animals, but is also better for the environment. It tells that the organic farms are more close to wildlife and land conservation programs (Jegtvig. 2008).
The article “Environmentally clean products are dangerous for the health”, published in 2002 by experts of the Moscow Institute of Nutrition named after Otto Kuusinen tells about harmful effect of organic food.
In the published report the results of two-year research was presented. The group of volunteers ate only environmentally clean food from Moscow shops. As it turned out, the last few generations have become used at the gene level to the nitrates that are contained in the products. Nearly all people need them, as well as vitamins and minerals. With a lack of nitrates the body tries to compensate their content with overeating, or even such bad habits as smoking, alcohol and drug abuse.
Since the number of people on Earth over the past century has increased from 1.5 to 5.5 billion people and by 2020 the outgrowth is expected to be up to 8 billion, so there is a huge challenge facing humanity. The problem lies in the huge increases in food production, despite the fact that over the past 40 years, production increased 2.5 times, it is still not enough. Because of it the world has a social stagnation, which is becoming more vivid. The production of genetically modified (GM) products is now the most important and most controversial question.
The benefits of GM products are obvious: they are not exposed to the harmful effects of bacteria, viruses; they are characterized by high fertility and long shelf life. The consequences of their use are not obvious till the end yet: geneticists can not yet answer the question whether genetically modified foods are harmless for humans.
Genetically modified plants are plants in which the genetic material has been altered in a way that doesn’t happen naturally. GM plants include some alien that gives them some additional qualities; for example, develop resistance to herbicides and pesticides, increasing resistance to pests, increase yields.
GM products appear in a result of implantation of another DNA to the plant. Donors for such implantations can be bacteria, viruses, other plants, animals and even people. For example, it was got a frost-resistant tomato, in which the DNA of North American marine flatfish was built in. To creation of wheat that is resistant to drought, the gene of scorpion is used.
The first transgenic products have been created by Monsanto Company (USA) at the end of 80`s. The first planting of transgenic crops were made in 1988, and in 1993 the first products with GM components appeared for sale. The first transgenic product was a tomato.
Full range of studies of the GMO impact on humans and animals has not been yet carried out. Assessment of nutritional risk from the consumption of GMO products is now available on the basis of fragmentary data and not completed scientific facts.
Many scientists are afraid that GMO increase the risk of food allergies, poisoning and mutations, promotes the formation of tumors, but also cause resistance to antibiotics. It is not excluded the possibility that foreign DNA can accumulate in internal organs of the body, and fall into the nuclei of cells of embryos, which can lead to congenital deformities and even fetal death. To the risk group can be included children up to 4 years old (Green. p. 17).
Allergenicity and toxicity can appear after eating GM food. More than half of transgenic proteins that provide resistance of plants to insect, fungal and bacterial diseases are toxic and allergenic.
Substances intended to control insects, can block the enzymes of the digestive tract, not only in insects, but also in humans and can also affect the pancreas.
A number of transgenic varieties of maize, tobacco and tomato, that is resistant to insect pests, produce lignin (a substance that prevents infecting of plants). It can break down into toxic and mutagenic phenols and methanol. Therefore an increase of lignin in fruits and leaves of plants is dangerous for people.
The most bright example of the toxicity of GMO was the case with the Japanese company Showa Denko K.. K., which brought to market a feedingstuff GM tryptophan, believing that it is equivalent to the unmodified counterpart. GM amino acid caused the death of 37 people and about one thousand five hundred were left crippled for the whole life (Freedman. p.50).
Carcinogenicity and mutagenicity are side effects of GM food. GMOs may be mutagenic and carcinogenic due to their ability to accumulate herbicides, pesticides and their decomposition products. For example, the herbicide glyphosate, used for the cultivation of transgenic sugar beet and cotton, is a potent carcinogen and can cause lymphoma.
Some herbicides can have negative effects on survival and health of human embryos, and cause mutations.
As a result of intracellular processes in the GM varieties of tobacco and rice, there is an accumulation of biologically active substances that can trigger a cancer. Studies have shown that rats that were fed with transgenic potatoes, composition of blood changed, there were identified some anomalies in the size of internal organs, almost all the dead animals had pathology of small intestine.
One more side effect is the emergence of antibiotic resistance. Most GM agricultural products in addition to genes that give them the desired qualities also contain antibiotic resistance genes as markers. Conventional antibiotics such as ampicillin (respiratory infections, sinusitis and urinary tract infections) and kanamycin (tuberculosis, infections of the upper and lower respiratory tract, treating wounds) are used in the production of food. There is a danger that they may be transferred to pathogens that can cause their resistance to antibiotics. In this case, the traditional methods of treatment of inflammation with antibiotics will be ineffective.
Resistance to a group of antibiotics used while treating lung infections, Chlamydia and urinary tract infections in Spain, the Netherlands and the UK reached 82%.