Protect Our Food Information
The Basics: Pharmaceutical and Industrial Crops
The health of our families is at stake.
Drug and biotech companies are using food crops to produce pharmaceutical drugs, hormones, and vaccines; industrial chemicals such as detergent enzymes, biofuels, and plastics; research chemicals; and untested food additives and dietary supplements. These drugs and chemicals were never meant to be eaten by the general public and could harm our families if they wind up in common foods such as corn chips, cereal, and baby food.
The ease of contamination was demonstrated in 2002 when drug maker ProdiGene allowed corn plants engineered to produce a veterinary drug to grow in a Nebraska soybean field. The subsequent harvest contaminated a grain elevator, and 500,000 bushels of tainted soybeans had to be destroyed. The same company was also responsible for an incident in which an Iowa corn field had to be burned because it may have been contaminated by pollen from adjacent pharma corn.
Another accident is just waiting to happen.
Basic facts about pharmaceutical and industrial crops
- Companies have planted corn, soybeans, rice, and other food crops genetically engineered to make human and animal drugs, hormones, plastics, detergents, and other industrial chemicals. Learn more about substances in pharma/industrial crops.
- The USDA has allowed pharma and industrial crops to be grown outdoors in 35 states since 1991—often close to farms where food crops are grown. See what kind of crops have been grown in your state.
- Pharma and industrial crops can get into the food supply when their seeds are inadvertently mixed with seeds of food crops during planting, growing, harvest, transport, and processing, or when the crops cross-pollinate with food crops. See how pharma/industrial crops can contaminate food crops.
- Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and other extreme weather events in areas where pharma and industrial crops are grown can increase the likelihood of contamination. In one case, a hurricane passed close by a pharma rice site in North Carolina. Though hurricane-force winds and flooding could have carried pharma rice seeds or plants off the site, USDA records contain no evidence of communication after the storm between the agency and the company growing the rice, nor did the USDA perform an inspection to determine whether plants or seeds had escaped. Click here to read more about lax USDA oversight of pharma/industrial crops.
- In a 2005 report, the USDA's Office of Inspector General strongly criticized key aspects of the agency's pharma/industrial crop enforcement program. They found, for example, that the USDA lacked basic information about the pharma and industrial crops it approved, including where and how the crops were being grown, and what became of them. The report recommended that the USDA strengthen its regulatory system.
- Several recent instances of contamination of long-grain rice with unapproved GE (though non-pharma) varieties underscore the USDA's inability to protect our food. These incidents have closed export markets and left American rice farmers reeling. Click here to read more about USDA's investigation into rice contamination.
Solutions
The USDA should ban the outdoor use of food crops to produce pharmaceutical and industrial chemicals. This is a simple and effective way to ensure that food remains uncontaminated. Only a ban can completely protect the food supply. Sign our petition calling on USDA to ban outdoor production of pharma/industrial substances in food crops.
There are a number of safe alternatives for producing pharmaceuticals and industrial chemicals. Some of these are already being used. The USDA should invest resources in alternative production systems and regulate them stringently.
Potential substitutes include:
Crops that have no food uses. Tobacco and jojoba are just two examples of nonfood crops that pose relatively little risk to the food supply if grown for drug or industrial purposes. Tobacco is already being used.
Indoor production. Pharma and industrial crops of all kinds can be grown in greenhouses or other enclosed structures with little danger of cross-pollinating with food crops. On-site processing of the resulting drugs and chemicals would help further ensure that plants and seeds don't contaminate food.
Cell cultures. Engineered plant, yeast, bacteria, and animal cells are already being used to produce drugs and chemicals in enclosed facilities without endangering the food supply.
