The world according to Monsanto : pollution, corruption, and

148 the world according to monsantomight last, depending on circumstances, from twenty-eight days to twoyears. Answering to the “precautionary principle,” as Congress required, thetests would have to demonstrate that there is a “a reasonable certainty thatthe substance in the minds of competent scientists is not harmful under itsintended conditions of use.” Excluded from the category of “food additives,”and therefore not subject to toxicological tests, were substances “generallyrecognized as safe” (GRAS), either because they were “used in food beforeJanuary 12, 1958,” or because “scientific procedures” have shown that theypose no health risk.I asked Maryanski, “Could you give me an example of substances classifiedas GRAS?”“Yeah, those are common food processing enzymes, or salt, pepper, vinegar,things that have been used for many years and that the scientific communityhas established as safe.”“And how was the FDA able to decide that the gene introduced into aplant by genetic manipulation was GRAS?” I asked, looking him in the eye.We had reached the heart of the debate between advocates and adversariesof GMOs. Indeed, even though no scientific study had yet been conductedto verify it, the FDA had decided a priori that transgenes did not fitinto the category of food additives and that GMOs therefore could be marketedwithout prior toxicological testing. This is all the more curious becausewhen the agency published its regulation, it had been consideringa request that showed how essential it was to wait. The California biotechcompany Calgene (the one that had given Monsanto a chill by announcingin Nature that it had succeeded in producing Roundup-resistant tobacco)had filed a request for the approval of a tomato christened “Flavr Savr,” manipulatedto slow the ripening process.There is no need to insist on the significance of a tomato tinkered with sothat it can remain firm on supermarket shelves for an extended period. Butit is important to know that it contained the kanamycin resistance gene andthat its inventors had rightly concluded that the gene should be considereda “food additive.” They had therefore asked a laboratory (the InternationalResearch and Development Corporation of Michigan) to conduct toxicologytests designed to measure the health effects of transgenic tomatoes on rats.But the FDA did not yet know the results of the study when it published itsregulation. It was later found that seven of the forty test animals had died aftertwo weeks for unexplained reasons and that a significant number of them