Genetic Engineering

Genetic engineering is a catchall term for the development of substantially novel living organisms and marks a breakthrough from selective breeding or conventional hybridization that has gone on without controversy for centuries. In its most common form, genetic engineering describes the direct transfer of genetic material across or within an organism's genome, which is then described as a “transgenic organism,” “genetically engineered” (GE) organism, or a “genetically modified organism” (GMO). GMOs breed true, while hybrids do not; the entire germ line of the modified organisms are permanently reconfigured. Scientists and private industry embrace transgenic modification because this allows the more precise insertion of genes carrying desired traits into target organisms. Genetic engineering is used in a variety of contexts. It has been relatively uncontroversial in medical applications such as human insulin and far more controversial as an agricultural technology.

To date, commercially grown genetically engineered organisms in agriculture have been limited to a few major grain and legume crops that function as industrial inputs for the modern food system and less effort into the manipulation of animals. The first wave of crop biotechnology emphasized traits to increase the economic efficiencies of large-scale farming. The two most common traits engineered into seeds are naturally occurring insecticides and tolerance to herbicides. The second wave is poised to deliver traits desirable for consumers, such as nutritional or health benefits. The third wave will bring factories to the fields in the form of crops that produce pharmaceuticals or industrial chemicals. From one perspective, it is merely the technological improvement on conventional plant breeding. But from another vantage, it poses the threat of serious ecological and social disruption. Genetic engineering is a highly controversial practice among some producers and consumers in industrialized nations, more so in Europe and Japan than in the United States. Its proponents regard it as a panacea for the world's food and environmental problems. But its critics charge that it will maintain worrying trends in industrial agriculture.