Controversy erupted on the international stage at the recent 2018 UN Meetings on Biological Diversity, where civil society groups including CAGJ called for a global moratorium on any release of engineered gene drives, citing the need to apply the precautionary principle. But what are gene drives, and how could they affect our food and farming systems? And what is their connection to GE mosquitoes, soon to be released in Burkina Faso in 2019?
CAGJ’s AGRA Watch Campaign and Food Justice Project collaborated to compile these resources about gene drive technology and it’s implications on our food system. Check them out below to learn more!
Statements:
- The biotech industry is trying to block the UN Conference on Biodiversity, but it won’t block farmers – La Via Campesina December 5, 2018
- A Call to Protect Food Systems from Genetic Extinction Technology: The Global Food Movement Says NO to Release of Gene Drives October 16, 2018 download PDF
Press Releases:
- Release of risky GM mosquitoes in Burkina Faso highly unethical – African Centre for Biodiversity, Third World Network and GeneWatch UK Johannesburg, November 9, 2018
- United Nations Hits the Brakes on Gene Drives – ETC Group November 29, 2018
- Over 200 Global Food Movement Leaders and Organizations Reject “Gene Drives”: New Report exposes how a controversial genetic forcing technology is targeting the farm – ETC Group October 16, 2018
Articles:
- From Terminator to Exterminator: 20 years after suicide seeds, civil society mobilizes in Egypt this week to stop the sequel – Gene Drive Organisms – ETC Group November 15, 2018
- For the first time, researchers will release genetically engineered mosquitoes in Africa – Ike Swetlitz, Business Insider UK Sep. 11, 2018
- Scientists Release Controversial Genetically Modified Mosquitoes In High-Security Lab – Rob Stein, NPR Feb 20, 2019
Reports:
- A Human Rights Analysis of Gene Drives – FIAN International November 2018 download PDF
- The Future of our Daily Bread: Regeneration or Collapse – Navdanya International [download PDF]
- GM Mosquitos in Burkina Faso: A briefing for the Parties to the Cartegena Protocol on Biosafety – African Centre for Biodiversity, Third World Network and GeneWatch UK November 9, 2018 [download PDF]
- Forcing the Farm: How Gene Drive Organisms Could Entrench Industrial Agriculture and Threaten Food Sovereignty – ETC Group October 2018 [download PDF]
- Gene-editing Organisms in Agriculture: Risks and Unexpected Consequences – Friends of the Earth September 12, 2018 [link is to press release; download PDF, download Executive Summary]
Videos & Film:
- Gene Editing, Gene Drives, and CRISPR: Risk Bites Guide to the Essentials – Risk Bites November 30, 2018
- A Dangerous Idea: Eugenics, Genetics, and the American Dream – Mary Morgan, Andrew Kimbrell, and others 2017
Scientific Literature & Gene History:
- New CRISPR-based technology developed to control pests with precision-guided genetics – University of California – San Diego January 8, 2019
- Experts agree: New GMOs can be detected – GM Watch January 2, 2019
- It’s the End of the Gene As We Know It – Ken Richardson, Nautilus January 3 2019
- Unravelling the DNA myth – Barry Commoner, GRAIN July 26 2003
