The provincial government of Cotabato will listen to what the proponents and those opposed to the fruit and shoot borer resistant Bt talong (eggplant) have to say, before deciding on what action to take for the planned Bt talong field trial in one of its municipalities.

North Cotabato vice governor Gregorio T. Ipong said in a Bt talong briefing with the provincial council last January 12, 2011 that listening to “both sides of the coin” is the best action for field trial. “The best way in discerning things is to always get back to how these things came about through scientific method…As a politician, I tend to listen to the emotions of the people. And yet as an engineer, I also have to listen to the scientific results. It is not a bad idea if both sides are seen and heard,” he said.

The University of Southern Mindanao (USM) in Kabacan, North Cotabato is one of the trial sites for the multi-location field trials of Bt talong in the country.

For transparency
On January 13, 2011, Bt talong proponents themselves explained the technology of Bt crops in a seminar held in USM. The seminar was attended by more than 300 participants composed of local government constituents, farmers, students, and other groups.

The “Seminar on Understanding the Science, Safety, and Benefits of Bt Crops Technology,” according to North Cotabato agri-council chair Vicente Sorupia Jr., was part of the public consultations to be held, in line with the local government code, which states that such activities need to be conducted before a project is implemented.

USM president Dr. Jesus Antonio Derije emphasized the need to know the results of Bt talong field trials. He said that USM’s mandates are instruction, research, extension, and resource generation. “Since USM is a research institution, we should know the consequences of the researches conducted in the campus. We need to know ‘would this experiment really be detrimental?’ We will know that based on scientific basis. We can’t just say that this is harmful just because of what we read.”

“USM is here to give the right knowledge to everyone. Our instructors and professors are ready to help or listen to your concerns regarding the Bt eggplant,” he also said in Filipino.

North Cotabato Board Member Vicenter Sorupia, Jr. explains in his opening message that the provincial government would first listen to all sides before deciding on the multi-location trials of Bt eggplant.

In his opening message for the seminar, North Cotabato Board Member Sorupia explained that the seminar was an offshoot of the letter that the council received from a group, the Citizens’ Food Watch, who requested for an inquiry on the Bt talong trials. The provincial council was decided that seminars from the proponents and the opposing groups be conducted before a final public hearing. Sorupia said that the provincial government wanted to hear both sides, hence the arrangement of conducting the seminars before the public hearing.

After Sorupia’s message, several anti-Bt talong members shouted their indignation over the setup, walked out of the room and held a rally outside the venue. The group did not go back to the seminar to listen to the experts to understand the science-based and factual information related to the Bt talong trial.

The seminar also aimed to rightly inform the public about the project. Dr. Desiree Hautea, Bt talong project leader from the University of the Philippine Los Baños, warned about the misinformation and disinformation spreading about Bt talong.

In the open forum, a student reported having seen a “Bt talong for sale” poster in a public market. Dr. Hautea said that is was a “misinformation with no ethical consideration.” She said that there have indeed been stories alleging that Bt talong is already planted and seeds are available in USM. She clarified that these are not true and related that the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) strictly monitors and counts all the seeds. “All the seeds that would not be germinated need to be destroyed in front of them (BPI). It is not true that there are GM talong seeds already planted in USM, and most of all, for sale,” she said.

Ms. Merle Palacpac, head of the Biotech Core Team of BPI, corroborated Dr. Hautea and said that the only approved GM crop for commercial planting is biotech corn, and no GM talong seeds have been brought to USM.

Bt technology: safety and significance, explained
Proponents of Bt talong, a regulator, and a farmer clearly made their points and explanations on the safety and potential benefits of the said crop during the Bt crops seminar.

Emphasizing the importance of biotechnology, both traditional and modern, was Dr. Emma Sales, USM professor and biotechnology expert. She reminded that many of people’s necessities such as food and medicine are products of biotechnology. She also said that biotechnology had been significant in improving present crops. She added that in contrast to the confused and scared sentiments of anti-biotech groups, biotechnology is a “word of hope” for informed people because they know it could help in solving health, environment and food supply problems.

Biotech corn farmer from Pangasinan, Rosalie Ellasus inspires the crowd as she narrates how biotech corn adoption changed her life.

Ms. Rosalie Ellasus, farmer and councilor from San Jacinto, Pangasinan, inspired the audience as she attested to the benefits of modern biotechnology, particularly the Bt corn. She narrated her inspirational life story: how she graduated as a medical technologist, became an overseas Filipino worker, and settled on becoming a biotech corn farmer, and eventually a farmer-leader.

Ms. Ellasus explained how her yield and income increased with biotech corn, which eventually brought her other benefits. This gave her a more sustainable livelihood. She has been a farmer-leader as well as a representative in other countries, sharing her experience as a biotech farmer.

Ms. Ellasus also expressed that with her experience with Bt corn and with what she learned about the Bt talong’s potential benefits, she was sure that it would also be a success in the farm. As a native of Pangasinan, Ms. Ellasus is hopeful that Bt talong will soon be available to the farmers so that they would also be able to reap the benefits of this very promising technology.

Philippine biotech regulation was also tackled in the seminar. Ms. Palacpac explained the conditions in the field trial, and how the proponent complies with each. She said that based on all her experience in about 140 field trials, they can ensure that the proponent can comply with all the conditions. She related that in all the field trials in the Philippines in the past 10 years, only two trials—one for Bt corn and one for Bt eggplant--experienced the uprooting of the experimental crops.

“Field trials need to be conducted to generate the local data needed by the BPI to evaluate the crop’s safety to environment, once it moves to the application for propagation,” explained Ms. Palacpac. “If the field trials will be halted, how would we know if it is safe or not? We will not let the proponent use the data from India. We need to see the event’s performance in the Philippines.”

Many biotechnology experts were not happy with the pre-termination of the Bt talong field trial in Davao City last December 17, 2010. In an article about the pre-termination in Scidev.net, Robert Wager of Vancouver Island University commented “Listening to anti-GMO activists will not educate anyone about the real science of GMO's. Pity the destroyed research will mean farmers will have to continue to spray their eggplants many times with pesticides instead of having the eggplants protect themselves. At some point in the future Bt eggplants will be widely grown and the environment will be far better off with reduced pesticide exposure. How long that takes depends on how long politicians listen to the pseudo-science and fear pushed by the critics of GM crops generally and Bt crops specifically.”

Government officials and university experts in the country also expressed indignation over the unanticipated pre-termination of the trial initiated by the city.

The pressing problem
Dr. Randy Hautea, SEAsia Director and Global Coordinator of the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), veered the topic to the current and real pressing problem, which is the growing demand for food and the need to double its production in the near future.

Citing an FAO food security report last October 2010, Dr. Hautea explained that globally, one in six people is hungry. He said that it is alarming that there are more hungry people today than in the 1960s. He also showed, based on the findings of the Social Weather Station, that the number of hungry people in the Philippines went up last November 2010.

Explaining that more Filipinos will be feeding from a hectare of land in the future, Dr. Hautea said “Where would we get the food? We cannot keep on importing forever. We need to produce for ourselves. Where will we get it? It has to come from the same area of land.” He added that cutting forests to expand land is not sustainable for the environment.

“We need to encourage and coax and inspire maybe our limited lands to produce more. And that is where technology can help, together with all other management interventions…The challenge is too big, that there is no single solution. Technology is just one of the solutions or one of the tools. And biotechnology is even only one of the technology solutions. So biotechnology is not the solution. It can be a contribution, together with agronomic improvements…” emphasized Dr. Hautea.

“The big problem is how to utilize all the technology—conventional, organic, modern biotechnology, modern farm management, infrastructure, communication. This is a problem or challenge that concerns everybody,” he said.
In the end, he emphasized that technology is just a small part of all the interventions that can be used to address the needs of people. All interventions—infrastructure, policy, governance, technology, etc.—are needed. And in terms of technology, biotechnology is not the only important thing. “…we should utilize and combine (all technologies) so that our farmers can choose the right technologies for their farms,” Dr. Hautea stressed in Filipino. “There is no one solution, so, there should be many options, and many technologies to integrate.”

Clear safety
For the first 14 to 15 years of Bt technology, in a billion hectares in more than 25 countries, there has been no food safety issue that has been recorded from any biotech crops, explained Dr. Randy Hautea, in answer to a question on what they think are the disadvantages of Bt technology.

Dr. Hautea added that before it was used in GM crops, Bt or Bacillus thuringiensis has been used as an organic pesticide.

On the relatively high seed price of Bt corn, Dr. Hautea reasoned that benefits overcome the cost. “If you look at the real adoption (decision to buy or not), the farmers still buy (the seeds).” Dr. Hautea said that this is an indication that farmers, at the end of the day, see the overall benefits, rather than the individual costs.

Dr. Hautea also reminded that farmers know their business. “No farmer can be duped by a technology,” he said. “If it is not useful to him, next season, he will not plant it. They are not easily taken by advertisements. They will never repeat something that is not useful. Farmers are very wise people and decision makers.”

Aside from its long history of safe use and farmers’ preference for it, as pointed by Dr. Randy Hautea, Dr. Desiree Hautea also gave more reasons on its safety.

Dr. Desiree Hautea, Bt Talong project leader from UPLB, answers all the questions in the open forum. She explains the positive impacts that can be brought by a pest resistant eggplant, and the safety of Bt technology's mechanism.

“Bt technology is a safe technology because it is very specific,” she said. She explained in her presentation how the Bt protein particularly targets only certain insects and not harm humans and other organisms. She made clear that the Bt protein is just like any protein when it enters the human body, and that many studies and papers, a consensus document from the international Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) included, corroborate the safety of Bt plants.

She said that compared to the pesticide-laden eggplants, the Bt talong is a much safer alternative. She explained that farmers reportedly spray chemicals 80 times every season, and that numerous studies show the detrimental effects of chemical pesticides to human health. Adding to the explanation on the safety of Bt crops, she pointed out “If you look at all the crops that we eat today, which one or what crops go through this level of safety testing?”

Dr. Hautea also expressed her sentiments to help farmers as a scientist. “I am not a farmer, but I’ve been engaged in the agricultural sciences in my entire professional life. I am the scientist in the scientist-farmer continuum. I know the difficulties. What I try to do is within the context. Ano ang binigay na gift ng Panginoon? [What gift did God give me?] It is the talent to do the research that I do. And hopefully, I contribute and make a difference to others who don’t have that talent. So I do that part as part of the community and as a person myself,” she said. (Jenny A. Panopio and Sophia M. Mercado)