Open AccessImplicações dos transgênicos na sustentabilidade ambiental e agrícola
Author(s) -
Rubens Onofre Nodari,
Miguel Pedro Guerra
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
história, ciências, saúde-manguinhos
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.277
H-Index - 18
eISSN - 1678-4758
pISSN - 0104-5970
DOI - 10.1590/s0104-59702000000300016
Subject(s) - genetically modified crops , human health , agriculture , sustainability , animal health , natural resource economics , risk analysis (engineering) , environmental ethics , microbiology and biotechnology , environmental planning , genetically modified organism , precautionary principle , business , biology , environmental resource management , geography , environmental health , ecology , economics , transgene , gene , medicine , genetics , zoology , philosophy
The potential risks of GMOs, their impact on human and animal health, and on the environment, as well as their socioeconomic effects, have generated a worldwide discussion which is far from drawing to a close for lack of sufficient information. Part of this information supports risk-hypotheses previously put forward. Thus the presence of transgenic plant genes in other plants and in other organisms has been confirmed in several occasions. Therefore, gene dissemination to plants of the same species as well as to widely different species is already regarded as an actual risk. The principle of substantial equivalence has opened the way for the liberation of transgenic plants for commercial crops, despite short-term tests, which are quantitatively and qualitatively insufficient to certify that the foods deriving from those plants are healthy and safe. Thus, the adoption of the so-called precautionary principle (PP) has turned out to be the most adequate safety measure to date, or else until scientific data should be able to demonstrate the actual impact of transgenic plants on human and animal health, and on the environment.